All The Stars
by Assbitch67
Summary: "Holy shit..." Max breathed in awe at the world in front of her. She was starting to believe she wasn't in Kansas anymore. "Welcome to the year 2259, Miss Proctor." After mysteriously being transported from the year 2019 to the year 2259, Max Proctor finds herself in for the fright of her life as she treks through the stars fighting for her life and her identity.
1. Prologue

_**Prologue**_

•••

**January 18th, 2296**

**Unknown Location**

**–––**

_Red Alert! Red Alert! Red Alert! _

Red lights blare and sirens echoe throughout a long, dark corridor. People– officers and scientists alike– scramble for either safety or escape pods. There are broken viles of glass scattering the floor, joined with discarded PADD's and shattered Communicators, all dropped in a mad rush as soon as the Federation's Flagship– the _U.S.S. Enterprise_– warped into their planet's atmosphere. The people had been warned of the oncoming attack, but not soon enough.

The person in charge of the ship– her captain, James Tiberius Kirk– hailed them and gave the people in the Bunker a choice: surrender or die. And anyone living under the roof of Project Olympus knew better than to surrender what they had, so they did what they do best: fight.

However, it didn't last long. Olympus's fighter ships had been shot down before anyone could even get them working and in the air. Photon canons, torpedoes, and phasers were locked onto the Bunker's location, and all Hell broke loose. Project Olympus was never going to win this battle, but they could win the war.

Further down in the lowest depths of the Bunker, away from most of the damage caused by the _Enterprise, _three handlers and their subject, Experiment 626 - Subject 3A– as they called her– bustled through the chaos infested corridors and crowded stairwells until they finally made it to their destination. The walls of concrete surrounding the large Lab shook, following the sounds of explosions, just as Subject 3A and her handlers entered.

"Is the _Pod _prepared for her take-off yet?" One of the handlers asked as they approached a series of computers with scientists in white lab coats seated behind the large holographic screens, typing and tapping away at whatever was powering and coding the large white oval in the center of the computers, wirings, and holographic coding. That was the _Pod, _and she was Project Olympus's final hope, as was Subject 3A.

Subject 3A stared at the _Pod _with a sense of child-like wonder. She'd heard of her fellow brothers' and sisters' marvelous and groundbreaking discovery with the _Pod, _but seeing it now, she wished it were under better circumstances.

And, as if on cue, a large explosion shook the Bunker once more, causing cement in the roof to shake loose and fall onto the bustling scientists, a few of them falling off their seats, even having some wiring come loose and explode with sparks.

"The coding is nearly complete, sir," a scientist explained from the far corner as she struggled to keep her computer upright after the explosion.

"We must move quickly and diligently. It won't be long before the Federation ship hits our life support systems or our back-up generators. If that happens, everything we've accomplished will be lost," one of the other handlers exclaimed to the group with great vigor and pain.

Subject 3A watched all of her colleagues fighting and working to get the _Pod _up and running for her. She wished there was more she could do. She was supposed to be ten times stronger than the average human, seven times faster, and fourteen times smarter, yet here she was, feeling as useless as ever as she watched her home be torn apart by a spacecraft sent to destroy her world and her family. And for what? All they were trying to accomplish at the Bunker was peace through human evolution. But it seemed that after the Eugenic Wars, no one wanted Enhanced Humans.

But it was already too late. Project Olympus had succeeded and they would prove the Universe and the Federation of Planets all wrong. The galaxy needed the Enhanced to show them a better way, the right way. So, they had to save the one person who could do that: Subject 3A.

Of course, she wasn't the first choice for the mission. It was supposed to be Experiment 626 – Subject 2B, her older, more advanced brother. But, he had been killed when the _Enterprise _had fired upon the first floors of the Bunker, killing the quarters of where most of the Subjects of Experiment 626 had been. The only reason Subject 3A was even still alive was because of an unscheduled check-up at the Bunker's Medical Ward that had stopped her from her doomed destiny like the rest of her siblings.

"Sir! The _Pod_; it's prepped for launch," one do the scientists called out from their station, as they stood up and walked towards the white oval ship, typing in coordinates and a date on the lit up key pad beside the clear glass door.

"Excellent," one of the handlers stated, clutching onto Subject 3A's arm, pulling her towards the spacecraft. The scientist opened the glass compartment door and let Subject 3A inside just as yet another explosion ripped through the Lab. This time, cement blocks fell from the roof and onto the scientists around the _Pod _along with a sparks spewing dim the wiring and fire shooting from the busted lights above. The scientists that had been working were suddenly running out in a panic while the Handlers began to strap Subject 3A inside the _Pod_.

"Listen closely, Subject 3A," the Handler spoke. "We have locked in the date and coordinates of your travels. We are sending you back three hundred years to the Founders of Olympus. They will help you." Another explosion rippled through the Lab, this time the power blew out and the only light that illuminated the Lab was of the fire and sparks around them. "You will warn them of what's to come from the Federation. Avenge us Subject 3A." The young woman felt tears falling from her eyes, only for a hand to quickly be placed on her soft cheek, rubbing the tears away.

"Be strong," the Handlers told her. "For you are our last hope."

Subject 3A could hardly hear now over the loud explosions growing closer, and the crackling fire, and the far away screams of her home, and sparks exploding, and the sounds of the _Pod_'s engine growing louder and louder as it started. Her own whimpers could barely be heard by her as the hand that lied on her cheek was removed. "I will not fail you," she spoke fiercely through her tears.

Before she could comprehend the collapsing ceiling above, the Handlers pressed a button on the lit up panel on the side and backed away. The glass door slid closed and as the engine got louder and louder, the white light that beamed from the _Pod _grew brighter and brighter until all that Subject 3A could see was white light. But, despite being blind from the outside world, the last thing she heard from outside the craft was the sound of an explosion followed by the shouting of her Handlers. Subject 3A gasped, a hand flying to cover her mouth as her tears bubbled over the edge and sobs escaped the back of her throat.

—–—

**June 14th, 1990**

**U.S. Airforce Base **

** Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A.**

**Earth**

–––

When Subject 3A finally opened her eyes after the white light had blinded her so much she had been force to look away, she found that she was no longer at the Bunker. But, she was in _a _bunker it seemed.

As soon as the _Pod_'s glass door slid open, Subject 3A's arms slid out of their restraint and she fell out onto her hands and knees. She was still trying to compute the fact that she had traveled three hundred years into the past and that her family and her home had been destroyed. But, she pushed aside all those mixed feelings and focused on her mission. Her mission that was standing right in front of her in the form of other scientists and men in uniforms. These were the Founders of Project Olympus.

The men in uniforms approached her. "You must be Subject 3A," one man began as she scrambled to stand straight. "We intercepted the transmission your Handlers sent to us from your craft. They explained the situation and our Fate three hundred years into the future... You are the last of Experiment 626, and you are our final shred of hope to ever continue what we began."

Subject 3A took a deep and sharp breath in. "I'm ready to enact revenge on those who have wronged us, Founders," she said with the bow of her head. "I request a meeting with your brightest minds to help me cumulate a plan on one, Captain James T. Kirk of the _U.S.S. Enterprise_, the man who murdered my family and destroyed my home."

She watched as the Founders glanced at each other, silently discussing what to do through their eyes and not their mouths. It would seem they had already come to a conclusion as to what to do as they turned back to her. "You have our full support, Subject 3A."

•••

**_A/N: So, like... My writers block for my other three stories, especially my Peter Parker/OC one MIGRAINE (for those of you who follow my other stories), has led to this brain child. Usually when I have shit writers block, my mind just dives into a completely different universe. And in this case, it's the Star Trek Universe. I hope you enjoy it, let me know what you think. I've only watched so much of the original series as well as the older movies, but this story will be solely based on the 2009 Kelvin Alternate Universe Movie timeline as well as the CBS Star Trek: Discovery series._**

**_Read and review, if you can because I honestly have no clue what the fuck I'm doing anymore. I think this is a mid-life crisis. _**


	2. I

**_Chapter One: Introducing Yet Another Person With Their Own Life Problems_**

**•••**

**May 25th, 2019**

**Radford High School**

**Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A.**

**Earth**

–––

"You want me to do what?" Hawaii's Resident Bitch— or so her boxing instructor liked to call her— asked incredulously to the red-head on her left as she threw the door to her locker open, shoving her backpack and other unnecessary things she carried inside.

"Oh, come on, Max, it's only one little party," the red-head chided as she nudged Max's shoulder. Max drew an aggravated face as she continued to shuffle through her belongings in her nearly empty locker. She had already cleaned it out a week ago, ripped off old pictures and returned old books that had been sitting in there since her freshman year. A part of her felt kind of sad and sullen looking into her barren locker, but the other part– the part that was absolutely ecstatic at the idea of getting to leave high school once and for all– was happy she finally got to abandon the crusty old locker she'd had for going on four years now.

"Max, please!" Her friend continued to pester her, breaking the blonde out of her nostalgic thoughts about her locker, of all things.

Max rolled her eyes at her friend's antics as she grabbed her wallet, earphones, and phone charger from the front pocket of her backpack and shoved them each into their own pocket in her collarless green leather jacket, running her hands briefly along the Gerber pocket knife inside one of them. After she had gotten what she needed, the blonde shut her locker door and started down the hall, her red-headed friend still following after her with a pleaded look.

"Come on, it'll be so much fun!" She continued to pester her.

"What'll be so much fun?" A new voice chimed in, and Max nearly choked on the sigh of relief she let out at her new friend's arrival.

"Oh, you have impeccable timing, Kim," Max told the brunette on her right as they walked through the crowded hallways. "Leigha here has been trying to convince me to go to... some cabin party for about five minutes now. Tell her to stop," the blonde deadpanned.

Leigha gaped while Kim merely chuckled at Max's jokes. "Adrian's cabin party? Leigha's right– I think it'll be good for you to go," she states with honesty as they turn the corner, entering the cafeteria.

Max turns to face the brunette, her face scrunched up in an exaggerated look of shock, her eyes wide and her mouth agape. "You? Thinking it's okay to go to a party? _In the woods_?" She asks incredulously. "Who are you...?"

Kim laughs out loud at Max's over dramatic antics. "It's just a party. And the last one of the year, if I may add."

"Which means it's basically your last chance to hook up with that Wallace guy you've had a crush in since, like, second grade," Leigha adds with a shit-eating grin on her face. Max is quick to shove Leigha away, reminding her that she's lucky she didn't just straight up punch her. Of course, Leigha only laughs like a good sport.

"Shut up," Max hisses through her teeth, glancing around the crowded cafeteria to make sure no one overheard Leigha's teasing. "And I have not been crushing on him since second grade! God, I'm a fighter, not a god damned fairy tale princess waiting for true love's kiss."

"Just true love's spicy hook-up at Adrian's cabin party." Leigha winks at Max as they take a seat at one of the outside seats, the sun's beams beating down in them through the few spots covered by the palm trees above. Max blushes furiously as she throws her face into her hands.

Kim giggles beside her friends. "Oh, ease up, Lee," she nudges the ginger's arm. "At least Max didn't totally nail her girlfriend at Munch's Winter Formal last year." Max's head shot up as she guffawed at the ginger girl who looked like she might implode on the spot.

"Lee looks like she wants to die– what'd I miss?" A new voice disrupted the girls' little laughter fest. Max, Kim, and Leigha all looked up to see their friend Adrian take a seat beside them at the table. Adrian was kind of new to the school. He'd moved there at the beginning of sophomore year with his Mom after she ran away with her new fiancée she cheated n her husband with. Adrian had little to no complaints considering the new daddy got him a brand new car and basically let him do whatever he wanted. Like, throwing a party at his step-grandparents' cabin in the woods.

Kim grinned mischievously at Leigha as she explained, "Oh, we were just talking about that one time Lee had the time of her life-"

"-in the restroom at Munch's party last year?" Adrian finished as he set his lunch tray down at the table and began to sort through his food items– Max not bothering to ask as she snatched his fruit roll-up off his plate.

Max munched on her snack as she watched Leigha's face contort into one of embarrassment and shock. "How does everyone know about that?!"

"Oh, honey, everyone sitting outside the bathroom heard it," Max chuckled as she tore another piece of the fruit roll up and popped it into her mouth with a shit-eating grin while Kim and Adrian howled in amusement at Leigha's utter devastation.

"So," Kim decidedly chimed in to change the subject promptly before their friend's face turned as red as her hair. "What's with your party tonight?" She turned to Adrian with a quirks eyebrow.

"Seriously," Max interjected, tearing another piece of fruit roll-up off from where she had spun it around her index finger to chew on like a turkey leg. "What, did you chloroform and tie up your grandparents in the cabin basement to get them to agree to this? Last I checked, they hated you."

"They don't hate me," Adrian clarified. "They're just afraid their precious Henry doesn't blow all his cash on the step-child they blow all their cash on already." He gave his friends a smug smile.

"Still doesn't explain how you managed to get their cabin," Kim stated.

"So, what'd you do?" Max prompted. "Steal their Viagra? Blackmail them with tax evasion? Poison their Gritz? What?" By the time she had finished listing everything off, Kim, Leigha, and Adrian were all in tears, laughing at her blunt and deadpan antics.

After Adrian had finally sobered up enough to say a sentence through his snorting, he explained, "No! They're on a vacation in Bermuda and they gave me the keys to the cabin to dog sit their labradoodle while they're away."

"Aw," Leigha cooed. "I remember you sending me pictures on Snap. She was so cute. What was her name again?"

"It's a he. His name is Marty," Adrian explained.

Max stared at him for a moment with an unreadable blank expression until she finally deadpanned, "I still maintain that you poisoned their Gritz and left them for dead in the basement." And so began the howling laughter once again.

But, their laughing fit was brought to a halt when the sound of a tray being slammed on the ground caught everyone on the courtyard's attention, including Max and her friends'. They all turned in their seats to see a tall, burly guy standing over another guy. He wasn't as pudgy as the boy that had knocked him and his lunch tray down, but Max wouldn't exactly say he was small.

"Holy shit," she Leigha hiss beside her as they watched the scene play out. "That's Wallace!" Max turned to her friend in shock before glancing back at the kid on the ground. Sure enough, when he turned his head t glance up at the bully who'd knocked him down, it was Wallace Price. Max couldn't believe she hadn't immediately recognized those amazing shoulders, the sharp jawline, or the model hair before when he had his head down. Usually she could've picked him out in a crowd... and not in a creepy way.

Max wasn't usually one for crushes. In fact, she found teenage guys in high school to be completely and utterly useless. She didn't see the point in relationships, especially in high school. Because sooner or later, they were going to end when someone left for college or started a job away from them. At least that's what Max felt. Her whole life revolved around getting out of this high school and off this island to go pursue her future. But one look from Wallace Price made Max completely rethink her life. Which was totally stupid in her opinion because he hardly even knew she existed. She blamed her teenage hormones.

"Get up, Price!" The burly guy standing above Wallace, who Kim explained was the captain of the basketball team, David Kalahe, shouted. Max watched painfully as Kalahe shoved Wallace as he tried to stand up, pushing him right back down into the ground. "Get up!" Max's teeth gritted and her hands clenched into fists. She couldn't stand bullies, especially not when they were bullying the guy she was so damn obsessed with.

When Kalahe shouted and shoved Wallace some more, Max made a move to get up and do something, but Kim was quick to latch a hand onto her wrist and pull her back down. She fixed the blonde with a knowing look when she turned to face her. "One more week until graduation, Max. Don't ruin it," she told her.

Max frowned, glancing back at the scene on the courtyard a few yards away. Kim was right. She couldn't just go up there and get into yet another fight. It was a problem Max had with finishing other people's fights. When people would mess with Adrian, Max stepped in. When a rumor got spread about Leigha, Max would make it go away. When one of Kim's exes got a bit too touchy, Max would fix it real quick. And when someone was getting ganged up on unfairly, Max was quick to defend them. This situation with Wallace and David was no different. But, Kim was right. There was only a week left in school and the last thing Max needed was to get in trouble for yet another fight. But if she just let this play out– "get up, Price!"– who was going to get David Kalahe in trouble and show him not to screw with people half his size? Definitely not Wallace Price, and definitely not those bitch ass administrators who had their thumbs up their asses.

"Come on, Price!"

_Screw it_.

Max abruptly ripped her wrist out of Kim's grasp and jumped out of her seat, her boot heels clicking on the ground as she walked over to David, tossing what was left of her finger-fruit-roll-up into the trash bin on her way over to kick his ass. "Hey, Kalahe!" She shouted.

"Wha- _oh_!" He shouted when he spun around only to be met with Max's fist across his face. She watched him make a whole 180 degree spin after she knocked him down to his knees. And once she had him where she wanted him, she grabbed his shoulders and shoved his face down onto the knee she jerked upwards. 'Ooh's and 'ah's filled the tense air of the courtyard as they watched Max shove David Kalahe's unconscious body onto the ground.

She stepped over his body and held a hand out to Wallace, who had been watching her with curious eyes the entire exchange. Wallace looked between her and her hand before finally grabbing on and letting her help him up. Max felt her breath catch in her throat as Wallace stared at her with those perfect hazel eyes. Damn... This must've been a dream because when she heard him say, "Thanks," she could've sworn her heart skipped a beat. Geez, when did she turn into such a fucking girl?

"Proctor! Price!" So much for this being a dream... It couldn't have been because if this were a dream, she knew damn well that the hag that was walking towards her and Wallace wearing a grey pantsuit, weird owl earrings, and pantihose that were two shades too dark for her skin tone, definitely made this a nightmare.

Max sucked up all the sarcastic and bitter energy she felt in every fiber of her body and turned to face the school's bitchy vice principal with a bright and beaming smile. "Hi, Mrs. Vialobos."

The Hag scrunched her face in distaste. "Don't start with me, Proctor. My office– _now_." Max rolled her eyes to the back of her head before brushing past the Hag and David Kalahe's unconscious body, Wallace by her side. Max looked out to find Adrian, Kim, and Leigha all with different expressions on their faces. Adrian looked shocked, Kim looked both disappointed and pissed, and Leigha gave her a big smile and two thumbs up– which earned her a kick in the shin from Kim. Max could only chuckle and shake her head as her and Wallace began their walk of shame to the principal's office. This was not how Max had saw her last week of high school starting.

–––

It was safe to say spending the rest of the day in the bitchy VP's office hearing her nag and whine about Max 'trying to be cute' and 'using violence as a coping mechanism' or– Max's personal favorite– how she 'can't get away with everything just because your Daddy's a top-shot on base'– was shit. God, Max hated that old Hag. Which was why as soon as she was released from Hell, otherwise known as the confines of her office, Max was quick to pick up some 'supplies' from her Guy behind the drug store a few blocks away on her way home.

"_Here comes the sun, doo-do-doo-doo. Here comes the sun, and I say, it's alright..."_

Max laid her head back against the back of the warm cushioned seat of her Jeep Wrangler as she drove along the cliff side towards her home. The relaxing sounds of the Beatles' 1969 classic making her wish she had a Tesla to drive down this beautiful and scenic road for her while she just sat and enjoyed the scenery, maybe even dosed off a bit after smoking a small joint she'd made herself while at a stoplight. It wasn't enough to get her completely shitfaced, but enough to take the edge off of her after the cruel torture she'd had to endure while putting up with Mrs. Vialobos.

_"Little darling, it's been a long cold, lonely winter __..."_

It was a rare occasion when Max would smoke. She didn't enjoy it for recreational purposes, like most of her friends and classmates did in their free time beneath the football field bleachers or in the locker rooms and bathrooms. She smoked it more for the feeling it gave her that all the stress and problems she had were lifted off her shoulders momentarily. That the pain and the craziness all inside her head was just gone if not for just a sliver of time.

_"Little darling, it feels like years since its been here__..." _

Of course, if her Dad ever found out about her 'high-times' she would probably be strung up and burned at the stake. But, lucky for her, it wasn't like he cared much of what she was doing while he was away on a covert mission in Kuwait. Mrs. Vialobos was right about one thing in her entire petty little rant: she couldn't get away with everything because of her dad, but she could get away with a whole lot when he was gone. Like, for example, attend a stupid party in the middle of nowhere while pretending to like the taste of beer, the stench of sweaty bodies in a crowded space, and the feeling of someone casually touching every part of your body while using the excuse they were just passing by.

_"Here comes the sun!" _

God damn Wallace Price for those beautiful hazel eyes and that perfect mouth of his as he spoke in the waiting room outside the Hag's office. "I'll see you at your friend– Adrian's party, right?"

And she was stupidly in love enough to reply, "Yeah. Definitely," without skipping a beat. Dammit!

_"Here comes the sun, and I say, it's alright..."_

Max let out a both frustrated and content sigh as she reached her hand over to turn up the radio, her small half-smoked joint still in between her middle and ring finger as George Harrison's soothing vocals continued to blast through her car. Max mouthed along to the song, bobbing her head and tapping her free left foot on the car floor as she stepped on the gas with her right. She enjoyed the feeling of the wind through her hair in her windowless Jeep with the spare tire on the back and the mileage that could give a trucker a run for their money.

Max tried not to close her eyes as the scenery passed her by. On the left side of the road was jungle climbing up a large hill, filled with tropical birds, exotic colorful plants, beautiful shrubbery and greenery. The luscious color and vibrant pop of it all bringing her joy and excitement. And to her right, past the cliff edge, was a vibrant sea of blue waves as far as the eye could see, making her feel grounded and mellow.

_God, I love Hawaii_, she thought to herself before taking another hit of her joint, blowing out the smoke and letting it catch in the breeze as she turned onto a dirt pathway off the side of the road, almost hidden in the jungle brush. Max jerked the steering wheel slightly so not to hit the mailbox with the name 'PROCTOR' written in big, bold, blue letters on the side that told her she was home.

After driving a few minutes along the dirt path through a few twists, turns, and over a small river surrounded by even more jungle, the brush of wildlife eventually opened up into a vast open space of field that held room for a driveway, a house, a barn, a large hangar all the way out back, and a pier beside the enormouse lake that connected to the ocean.

Max turned down the radio and pulled to a stop alongside a silver Escapade SUV just outside the large three story house– four, if someone were to count the basement below. The blonde turned off her car and climbed out, quick to put out what was left of her joint on the ground and kick it beneath the Jeep to ensure no one else could find the evidence unless they were determined to.

She reached into the Jeep, grabbed the denim satchel seated in the passenger's seat to fling it over her shoulder, pocketed her keys beside her knife, and walked her way up the steps onto her porch and then into her house.

The Proctor's had money. Everyone on the island was aware of that. Her father made good income with being– as the Hag would put it– a top shot at the local military installation a few miles away, and her mom made her living as a top-secret scientist. She didn't make much. Lucky for them, her family was overly compensated after she was killed in an experiment gone wrong about ten years ago. Max tried not to think about it too much. Though, how could she not when almost every surface of the house had at least one memory with her in it.

The blonde teen made her way through the foyer, past the living room, and into the kitchen where she found someone was already starting on dinner. It smelled good, Max noted,but she wasn't entirely sure what it was exactly. The blonde then decided it wasn't worth her time trying to figure it out since she wouldn't be home when dinner would be served.

_"INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!" _

Max was momentarily startled at her loud ring tone blasting out of her phone. She pulled it out of her back pocket and glanced at the caller ID. It wasn't in her contacts and the first thing she noticed about the number was that the first three digits formed the area code for New York... Max rolled her eyes as one name, three letters came to mind: NYU.

Despite every irritated bone in her body telling Max to hang up and block the number, the other rational and decisive part of her knew the her dad would find a way to get them to call her back again, and again, and again, until she was finally shoved into submission and admission to go to a college– any college– just as long as it wasn't the military. So, Max swiped her finger across the phone screen and put the phone to her ear.

"Hello?" She asked in a higher-than-normal-pitch.

_"Hello. This is the Board of Admissions at NYU calling for an over-the-phone-interview with Miss Amelia Proctor,"_ a deep, monotones voice replied.

Max took a deep breath before putting on her best game face to answer, "This is Salina Proctor– Amelia's step-mom. I'm sorry she can't come to the phone right now, she's currently at a study group until nine tonight. Would you like me to have her call you back whenever she returns?" Damn, she was too good at this lying thing.

There was a pause on the other line and Max held her breath, waiting for the answer, which was always the same. Of course, this school was no exception. "_No_," an agitated voice grumbled in response. _"That's okay. Thank you for your time, Mrs. Proctor._"

"Of course. Ba-bye," Max chimed smugly before hitting the 'END CALL' button and smiling down at the screen as the line went dead. _Bullet successfully dodged_, the blonde thought to herself. But then she had to turn around and go face to face with a new problem: her actual step-mom staring at her knowingly with her hands on her hips and her stink-eyebrow up into the high Heavens. _Or not..._

Max's shocked expression quickly morphed into an awkward grimace. "Hey, Sal-"

"Don't you 'hey, Sal' me, Amelia," the permed, African-American woman cut her off with the snap of her perfectly polished fingers, her lips pursed like squished tulip to show just how disappointed she was in her step-child. Max visibly flinched at the use of her full-first name and a spark of pride went through Salina Proctor's body at the sight. It's not that she enjoyed hurting a girl she had cared for as her own for the past nine years, but because she enjoyed knowing she still had authority over the girl who had caused almost 90% of all her headaches. And she had four more kids she popped out herself!

Sal pursed her lips as she walked slowly around Max as if she were a lioness stalking her prey. Max definitely felt like a gazelle. "You wanna explain to me why you just tried to pretend to be me? Hate to break it to, sweetie, but, uh, you don't got the skin tone to pull ME off." The dark skinned beauty gestured to her coffee pigmented skin, then to Max's slightly tanned arms pointedly. "So, who was it on the phone?" Sal asked as she turned away from the blonde teen to return to her work in the kitchen cooking dinner.

"Um..." Max fiddled with the ring on her right middle finger. It had been a habit ever since her mom had gifted her the ring as a gift on her fifth birthday. It was a match that was melded into a circular ring. Her mother had told her that she could light up the world with a singular match lit inside her heart, and to always remember that when she looked down at her ring. Max had to remember that. She was strong, and there was a reason she was lying in the phone and no need to hide it. "It was the NYU Admissions Board."

There was a loud clang from the stove where Sal had dropped the top of the pot from her hand. Max only saw her back stiffen, but she knew she was probably fuming.

Sure enough, when her step-mom spun back to face her slowly, her face was contorted with so much rage and fury, Max was pretty sure she could see smoke blowing out of her ears like in the cartoons her little sisters watched in the morning everyday. "You... You told them you weren't here and asked if you could call them back? NYU? As in, the University of New York?!"

Max nodded nonchalantly.

"_Are you insane_, child?!" She exploded. Max merely rolled her eyes and slumped into one of the bar stools at the kitchen island marble counter. "Don't you roll your eyes at me, Amelia Alexis Proctor! That was your future on the line and you just..." Max looked blandly at Sal, waiting for her to realize the one thing that was blatantly obvious. "Wait a second, you... NYU wasn't the only school to call you, were they?"

The blonde took a deep breath, looking pointedly at Sal as she grimaced as if to say 'yeah, no shit'.

"You declined over-the-phone interviews to more than one university?!" Sal asked incredulously. "Amelia Proctor, do you have any idea how much work it took your father to get you those interviews-"

"I didn't ask him to pull any strings, Sal!" Max retorted at the mention of her father.

"Why, Max?" Sal asked, clearly defeated and exhausted. "Why would throw your future out of the window like that?"

Max's jaw set as she let out a heavy sigh. "Because that's not the future I want, Sal," she told her with the most genuine tone the woman had ever heard the teenage girl use when discussing anything like this before.

Sal's pleasant surprise was replaced by a knowing look of warning at the girl. The topic of what Max's heart really desired to do after high school was a tough subject for the Proctor family, especially for Max and her father. Because ever since Max had gone to her first Tae-Kwon-Do class, threw her first punch with her Mom's help, shot her first gun with her Dad behind her, and flew in her first plane on her seventh birthday, Amelia Proctor knew she wanted to join the U.S. Military, just like her Mom and Dad. But, after tragedy struck at the base and her Mom died in an experiment gone terribly wrong, Max's father vowed to her that he would never allow Max to live the same way she did, taken abruptly before her time with not even so much as a goodbye or a body to bury.

This strained both her and her father's relationship, everyone who knew them could tell, including Sal and the rest of Max's half-siblings. Max had her wishes, and Jason did everything he could to keep her from achieving them. It was safe to say that no matter what he tried to do, Max was one stubborn girl and wouldn't let one man– even if it was her father– stop her.

"Max," Sal began, the disdain in her voice clear as day. "You know what your Dad will say-"

"What he says every time I bring it up!" The blonde snapped. "He doesn't want to discuss it like regular adults, and instead, tries to shove his grief and guilt down my throat. I mean, what kind of father does that to their kid?!"

"Your father has his reasons..."

Max forcefully grabbed a handful of peanuts from the nearby glass bowl on the counter as she stood up from her seat. "Yeah, well, they're stupid reasons," she marked, tossing back the handful of peanuts in her mouth before sauntering upstairs.

"Where are you going?!" Sal shouted after her with no heat behind the genuine inquiry, but the exhaustion and frustration was heavy in her voice.

"A party!" The blonde shouted over her shoulder as she started up the stairs. "If Dad wants me to stay out of the Military because he's afraid I'll make shit decisions and get myself killed, he can wait for the call that I made shit decisions and got myself killed at a high school party instead! Then maybe he'll pull his head out of his ass!"

Sal flinched when the teen's rant was over only to be followed by the loud slamming of a door upstairs. She groaned as she ran a hand through her permed hair. _Lord, give me patience because if You gave me strength I may strangle that stubborn child_, she prayed up to the ceiling before getting back to cooking.

–––

Max wasn't ever one for parties, especially not parties in random backwoods cabins, but she was dead set on going to this particular one and maybe stay there until the sun came up. Because if there was one personality trait she had that even she got annoyed with sometimes, it was her hard-headedness.

When Max pulled up in her Wrangler to the party, only slightly stoned, the first thing she noticed wasn't the insane amount of people were jam packed into one singular cabin, it wasn't the fact that there was enough plastic red solo cups in the yard to kill half the sea turtle population in the Atlantic (fuck them, she still used straws– sorry Leo, Ralph, Donnie, and Mikey!), or even the unhealthy amount of couples who were borderline screwing on the porch, on the stairs, on the couches, or in the driveway, but it was the fact that just as he had said, Wallace Price was standing in the back corner of the cabin kitchen with two solo cups in his hands, glancing around as if he was waiting for someone. Max's chest fluttered with anticipation when she remembered that he was waiting for her. Her.

Max bit the inside of her lip to keep from how much she wanted t smile in fear it might scare him away as she slowly approached. Her words got caught in her throat for a second when his face lit up in recognition. "Hey," he greeted her with a smile.

"Hi," she replied lamely.

"Oh, I, uh, got you a drink," Wallace stammered. Max found it comforting he too was a bit nervous. She wondered if it was because of her presence or because a couple that was literally inside each were slowly beginning to push onto Wallace's shoulder. "I wasn't too sure what you liked, so I just sort of got your friend Adrian to make you a vodka tonic."

Max literally pinched herself in the arm before taking the cup from him. She had to be dreaming. The guy she had been in love with since, like, the second grade was actually handing her her favorite drink while at a party. This was the stuff of her dreams... and the good kind, too. "Thanks," Max said as she took a sip. She but her lip and tried not to cringe at the bitter taste. She noticed it tasted more... saltier than usual, but she just passed it off as being in the cup for so long. She wasn't sure just how long ago Wallace had had Adrian make it for her. She usually enjoyed her drinks fresh and still slightly cool, but she was in no room to complain because she would've gladly taken body shots from off of Wallace's beautiful collarbones she so desperately wanted to bite.

Max sighed, taking a long drink from her tonic in an attempt to cool herself down after that heated thought. _Down, girl, _she told herself as she brushed off yet another bitter hit of the vodka tonic in her cup.

"So, about this morning," Wallace began as he quickly maneuvered himself away from the couple who was now at third base on the counter beside him. "I just wanted to say thanks. I, uh, I felt kind of bad after we got dragged to the office. Mrs. V kind of tore into you."

Max shrugged. "Eh. She already hates me enough as it is. I just let her keep blaming me for her slowly declining marriage." Wallace's smile could've lit up the world. It lit up Max's world as he laughed, her right along with him.

Just then, the couple behind Wallace started pushing up against him harder and harder– "_Oh, harder, baby!_" The girl moaned directly into Wallace's ear. He winced while Max cringed. She then turned to the keg directly behind her and aimed the nozzle at the couple about to reach their climax. She hit the trigger and watched as they gasped and stammered while getting soaked in beer. "_What- what the Hell_?!" The girl screeched, as her and her boy toy quickly separated.

"You're welcome, I just stopped you from becoming a single mother of two at the age twenty-six living out of your parents' basement," the blonde muttered, an unimpressed look on her face as she returned the keg nozzle back to where it was. "Thank me later." She felt a flicker of pleasure go through her at the sight of Wallace's smile. She thought she even saw him glance at her legs back up to her face from the corner of her eye as she watched the soaked couple walk off int the dancing crowd in the living room.

Sure enough, when Max turned back to face Wallace, his eyes held a glint of mischief and something else she couldn't suite name as he glanced at her through his beautiful eyelashes. "Hey, you wanna go somewhere quieter?" He shouted over the bass boosted from the speakers and the shouting drunk teenagers. "Away from all this?"

"Sure!" Max shouted in response, letting him drag her along through the crowds and down the stairs to the cabin basement. While on the way down, she caught sight of Leigha, Kim, and Adrain all standing near the front door. Lee was beaming, throwing her a thumbs up with a cup of beer in her hand as she awkwardly stood beside Adrian and Kim who were sucking the lips off of each other against the wall. Max made a mental note to ask about that development later because right now, her mind was occupied on the fact that she was now in a locked basement with Wallace Price, a vodka tonic in her hand, and his eyes in her as he slowly led her to the leather couch in the middle of the empty basement.

Max felt her breath hitch as Wallace's left hand slowly trailed from where he had held her wrist up her arms, along her collarbone, to finally come to stop at her jaw. His thumb caressed her cheek and the rest of his fingers slowly began to tread their way through her blonde curls just over her ear. Max felt herself subconsciously begin to lean towards him, her eyes beginning to close as she felt the moment she'd been waiting for for so long to finally happen.

"You were amazing this morning in the courtyard," she heard Wallace murmur, his breath tickling her lips as she kept leaning towards him, waiting for his Lis to meet her in anticipation. But when Max went to open her eyes, she felt odd that her eye lids were oddly heavy and her body was tired and didn't want to move. Was she starting to knock out? Why?

Wallace didn't seem to notice as his hand went to trail from her check back down to her neck. "So beautiful," he whispered, his voice sounding like he was a million miles away, yet right beside her as he spoke to her from underwater. "Just like your mother..."

Max's heart stopped.

She began to panic, but her eyes wouldn't open, her body wouldn't move as it slowly slouched against the couch. Both her hands were empty; she must've dropped her vodka tonic in all the mess. Max tried reaching for her Gerber knife or her phone, but her hands were frozen as she kept blinking heavily, attempting to fight against whatever force that was making her go to sleep. She even opened her mouth to try and scream, but the noise got caught in her throat again. "Hn..." she mumbled before her eyelids went down once... twice... a third time, and everything went black.

This is why she hated going to parties and didn't date cute boys.

•••

**_A/N: Hello! And welcome back to 'Fuck Ally's Fucking Writer's Brain' where today she will be coming out with yet another story because her brain just keeps throwing them at her and she doesn't know what the fuck to do even though she has three other stories, a life, a job, a fiancée, and fifty million other things she still has to do ;). _**

**_I swear to god, my writer brain hates me, and i hate it. We have a weird relationship. _**

**_Anyway, meet Max, she's my new baby and she is now in trouble because FUCK WALLACE. This is just a glimpse into Max's life and who she kind of is as a person. We'll get to know her more as the story moves along, but I hope you like her so far. Her face claim is Erin Moriarty because I fell in love with this blonde beauty when she came as Annie January in my new favorite show The Boys– which, ironically, got me re-hooked me on Karl Urban, which re-hooked me on Star Trek, which brought me here. So, blame The Boys for this. And also go watch it, that shit is hilarious and I love Eric Kripke so much. _**

**_Whatever, I hope you enjoy this first official chapter. Welcome to All The Stars. Buckle in, it's gonna be a wild ride. _**


	3. II

_**Chapter Two: What The Fuck? Is This Allowed? Is That Allowed? **_

_**•••**_

**March 17th, 2259**

**Starfleet Headquarters**

**San Francisco, California, U.S.A**

**Earth**

–––

"You would think being an Admiral and all, I would have less paperwork since I'm no longer, technically active duty," Admiral Christopher Pike– formally _Captain _Christopher Pike of the _U.S.S. Enterprise _until almost a year ago after the incident at Vulcan with the time-traveling Romulans– muttered to himself.

He'd lucked out, thankfully, and hadn't been killed (which was always a plus in his books), but he was severely injured. After those bastards shoved that damn Centurian Slug down his throat, his spinal cord suffered heavy damage. Thankfully, the doctors were able to repair it enough to where he could stand and walk (with assistance of a cane and not for long periods of time), but the recovery took long and he was asked to be relieved of his strenuous duties of Captain to be given a higher promotion of a Starfleet Admiral on Earth, away from all the chaos.

Unfortunately for Pike, he was never away from the chaos. Especially when the Captain who relieved him of his duty was none other than that hard-headed and impulsive blue-eyed bastard he'd picked up in Iowa. But, taking a risk and talking James Tiberius Kirk into joining Starfleet had to have been one of the bets decisions Pike had ever made, and because of it, those Romulans were long gone and Earth didn't suffer the same fate Vulcan had.

At the though of the new Captain of the _Enterprise,_ Pike glanced over at the photograph at the edge of his desk. It was framed picture taken of the day Kirk had relieved him of his Captain duties. Pike had never felt more proud of the kid than he had then. Sure, Jim had his ups and downs, but... "He's still a jackass," Pike finished softly to himself before turning back to the problem he was facing currently that had nothing to do with blood-thirsty Klingons, or wormholes, or time-traveling Romulans. But it had everything to do with the stacks and stacks of paperwork on PADD's stacked miles high atop his desk. He had planned on making it home to his wife by nine tonight, but seeing as it was already two in the afternoon and he hadn't even made it through half of the stack, it was highly unlikely he'd make it.

With a heavy sigh, Pike grabbed the first PADD his hand could reach and began to go through the endless amount of words on the screen. The Admiral had barely gotten through half of it when his Communicator went off. Pike resisted the urge to roll his eyes as he flipped open the silver device in the palm of his hand. "Pike," he answered gruffly.

"_Sir, this is Lieutenant Hagard– Head of Security on campus,_" a deep voice replied on the other end.

"I'm aware of who you are, Lieutenant." Pike tried not to sound so harsh, but he was still ticked about being interrupted just as he was starting to become productive.

"_Well, I'm calling about security breach we had earlier this morning..._"

"You mean, the girl one of our nurses found on the South Lawn knocked out?" Pike recalled the incident he had been briefed on hours ago when he had first arrived at his work. He had passed it off as just another one of the Cadets from the Academy who had gotten a bit too drunk and just decided to make the South Lawn their bed and had ordered a few of the nurses to take a look at the girl before releasing her back to whatever classes she was going to. He wondered why it was coming up again now. "I thought our Medical Staff was taking care of it?"

"_They are, sir. It's just... _" He trailed off.

Pike lifted his head at the Lieutenant's silence. Something was wrong, he could tell. "Just what, Lieutenant Hagard?"

"_The nurses and doctors are requesting you come down to the Medical Center, sir. Something about some odd developments._"

As much as Pike wanted to shout at the Head of Security to get another Admiral on campus to do it, his interest was piqued and he was curious to see what 'odd developments' had come up during the medical analysis of the washed up girl. "I'll be right there. Pike out." And with that, the Admiral shut his Communicator and grabbed hold of his can beside his desk. As much as he would've liked to stay and do paperwork, it seemed something else had come up. Sorry, Starfleet.

It took Pike a total of fifteen minutes to get to the Medical Center downstairs from his office across campus where they were keeping the washed up girl. When he walked in, cane in hand, the first thing he noticed was the alarming amount of people inside. There were white-coats wandering around with PADD's in their hands, rushing around the area for things unknown, and all the way in the back behind all the chaos was a single bed with a single patient lying unconscious on it.

"Admiral Pike."

The admiral turned his head to the sound of his name being called and found the source to be one of the head doctors at the Med Center. "Dr. Winters," he greeted the half-Betazoid doctor that approached him with the firm shake of his hand. "Mind explaining what's going on here?" He asked, gesturing to the madness in the clinic. "Are those paper files?" Pike added when he took notice of the odd sight of a cardboard box filled with manila folders stuffed with paper files sitting on one of the empty beds nearby. That was odd, Pike could've sworn the use for paper files had gone out of style centuries ago after the PADD made it so much more easier to store data and texts and files into the cloud and online archives.

"Um, yes, sir, they are," the Betazoid doctor explained with a sheepish smile. "And I apologize for the mess in here. It's just been a bit hectic since our patient arrived this morning."

Pike's eyebrows furrowed in confusion as he glanced down the hall at the girl in the bed. "All this chaos for one girl?" He asked. "Who is she?"

"Well, that's the problem, sir: we don't know," he stated as he began to lead the admiral through the crowd of doctors and nurses rummaging through papers and PADD's for information unknown to them to get to the unconscious blonde.

Pike studied the girl lying down on the hospital bed. There were many things that stuck out to him. For one, she was wearing odd clothing items– ripped denim jeans, blacked heeled boots with spikes on the sides, a white graphic t-shit with a picture of what seemed to be an old album cover from a group of women called 'TLC', and a leather jacket– but it was all burnt. Her jeans had charred holes in them, her boots looked ashy, her 'TLC' shirt had similar holes to her jeans, and her leather jacket looked completely lost to the flames of whatever seemed to burn her. "What happened to this girl? Someone burn her?"

"It seems that way," Dr. Winters remarked as he gestured to her charred clothing. "But, the odd thing is that none of her skin or body were hurt by whatever burned her. Not sure how you burn someone's clothes, but not burn them."

"Is that the 'odd development' I was called down here for, Doctor?" Pike questioned.

"Oh no, Admiral. That's just the tip of the iceberg of weird this girl is." Pike three the doctor a look of confusion as he continued to walk around the blonde young woman to take a hold of her limp arm at her side, a needle sticking out from it where it seemed they were giving her fluids. "We've been giving her fluids for the past six hours since she was brought in."

"She's been unconscious all this time?"

Dr. Winters nodded. "We can't seem to wake her up. It's like she's in a coma."

"Do you know what's causing this?" Pike asked.

The doctor then turned to his right and called out, "Nurse Cho!" A moment later, a short Asian nurse in her white Starfleet uniform approached with two PADD's balanced on her forearms. "This is Nurse Helen Cho, she's been running diagnostics on this woman's blood since she came in and wouldn't wake up."

"Hello, Nurse, I'm Admiral Pike," Christopher greeted her.

Nurse Cho shook the hand he outstretched for her. "Nice to meet you formally, Admiral. I was one of the nurses that helped during your spine operation last year," she explained.

"Oh, well, thank you for all you've done for me." She gave him a small smile in response. "Is there anything you can tell me about the girl's status? Will she wake up?"

Nurse Cho cast a worried glance down at the blonde girl on the bed before turning back to Pike. "We're certain she will. We just don't know when." Pike furrowed his eyebrows and narrowed his eyes, looking between them questioningly. Cho caught sit of his glance and was quick to explain. "We were able to take some of her blood and found out some peculiar things about our patient." Cho began to hit a few buttons on one of the PADD's in her hands before handing it over to the admiral to take a look.

"Like?" Pike prompted as he took the PADD from the nurse.

Dr. Winters was the one to answer for her, "Like the fact that the thing keeping this woman unconscious isn't copious amounts of alcohol like we previously believed–"

"Though we did find a small trace of it in her system as well as a hint of marijuana," Nurse Cho interject as Pike scrolled through the data on the PADD, charts of what was in this girl's blood, her blood type, her iron level, the strains of virus inside of her.

"Hm, old school," Pike commented about her choice of recreational drugs. "So, if she didn't get drunk out of her mind, what is keeping her in this minor coma?"

"Flunitrazepam," Nurse Cho stated as she reached across the patient to click on a seperate tab on the PADD the admiral was holding, pulling up a text about the drug she had just named. "Or Rohypnol– a drug that was outlawed and hasn't been used in centuries. More commonly known in the 21st century as the 'Date-Rape Drug'."

Pike looked up from the article at the Doctor and Nurse. "This girl was roofied?"

They both nodded. "But, the dose she was given was extremely high," Nurse Cho exclaimed.

"Which means?"

"It means we don't know whether she'll wake up in a few minutes or a few hours," Dr. Winters explained. "This drug is so old, we can't be sure how this level of dosage could affect this young woman. Which is why we felt the need to bring out the old paper files we could dig up on the drug."

"Well," Pike sighed, handing back the PADD to the Nurse. "Notify me of her status when she wakes up. I'll file a report to launch an investigation into who drugged this girl and get to the bottom of it as soon as possible."

The admiral elegant to turn away when Dr. Winters called after him. "Sir, I don't think that's possible!"

Pike spun back around to face the doctor, a clearly confused look on his face. "What do you mean you don't think it's possible to file a report to find out who drugged this girl? She's a citizen of Earth in America and deserves a full investigation and trial to figure out who did this to her."

"That's yet another problem we have with our patient," the doctor explained, gesturing to Cho who handed him the second PADD in her hand.

Pike took it, his eyes trailing through the readings of more substances found in the girl's body. "What am I looking at, Doctor?"

"That is the readings of man-made viruses we found in her bloodstream."

"Xeno-series?"

"No, sir," Nurse Cho answered. "These are ancient vaccines. This girl doesn't even have the Xeno."

Pike looked up from the PADD. "Ancient viruses? How ancient?"

"Well, considering we haven't had to vaccinate someone for polio, measles, mumps, chicken pox, or the flu in over a hundred years– quite old, Admiral," Dr. Winters explained. When he saw the look of shock and wonder on the admiral's face, he knew that Pike was just as encaptured by this mysterious young woman like he and his team at the Med Center had been when they discovered these things about her. "I told you: just the tip of the iceberg."

"So, this girl has ancient vaccines, burn marks on her weird clothes, and high levels of outlawed drugs in her system... Is that it?"

Pike watched as both the Doctor and the Nurse exchanged knowing exasperated looks with each other before turning back to him. "Not even close, Admiral Pike," Dr. Winters replied before Nurse Cho took back her PADD. "Another thing we found earlier in her blood work was an unknown element." After a few taps on her PADD screen, Nurse Cho handed the PADD back to the admiral. On the screen was an odd looking molecule chain of sorts he didn't recognize. He assumed this was the element they had found in this girl's blood.

"We were picking up the odd trace in all of her tests. We thought it was yet another weird vaccine in her system, but after more thorough blood work we managed to uncover that it was just a misplaced element coursing through her veins," Nurse Cho explained. "It doesn't exert a charge, it has no reaction to any of our tests–"

"It isn't even in any of our archives," Dr. Winters interjected with an incredulous look on his face.

"That old?" Pike questioned.

"No, sir. That advanced."

Pike glanced down at the blonde. "Please tell me that's the end of all the weird there is to know about her." He looked up at the pair of medical staff. "That is it, right?"

"Almost," Dr. Winters remarked. He turned breifly to Nurse Cho and dismissed her before beckoning another white uniformed Orion medic. "Admiral Pike, this is my Assistant Medical Officer, Dr. Gupta."

The green-skinned alien Doctor nodded his head in acknowledgment to the admiral. But, Pike's attentions wasn't directed at the color of his skin, it was the white sealed box in his hands. "Got something there for me, Doctor?"

Dr. Gupta nodded as he set the box down on the nearby stand beside the girl's bed. As he reached in to open it, Dr. Winters spoke, "These were the belongings we found on her person when she was brought in. They confirmed our suspicions," he explained.

"What suspicions?" Pike asked just as Dr. Gupta had pulled a sealed Baggie out of the box and handed it to him. Inside was an open black wallet with a long metal chain attached to it. But what caught his attention inside the wallet wasn't the odd white stars and symbols on the pouch, or the gift cards for various business he didn't recognize, or even the money Earth no longer used tucked into one of the slits, but the ID card of the blonde girl staring back at him.

'_Amelia Alexis Proctor_

_Born: 05/13/2001_

_State: HI_

_SSN: ***-**-****'_

Admiral Pike felt his jaw tighten and his lungs lose air for a split second after he retread the date of birth over and over again, trying to process it in his head. 2001. This blonde girl was born in 2001. She was almost 300 years old, yet she looked 18.

But as he put all the puzzle pieces together: the odd clothes, the vaccines, the outdated drugs, the money, the gift cards, and now the ID, Pike realized what they were dealing with. This girl was a time-traveler, and whoever brought her here clearly did it against her consent. Pike knew two things then and there. One, he needed to report this to the rest of Starfleet Seniority, and two, whoever this girl was, she was in for a big surprise whenever she were to wake up.

"We also found a cell phone charger, earphones, a pocket knife, and a purple lighter. All from companies that stopped manufacturing these products centuries ago," Dr. Gupta explained to a very numb Pike.

Pike abruptly tossed the wallet back to the doctors. "I want you to keep this clinic under lock-down," he instructed Winters. "How many people know about her status aside from your other associates?"

"Only my ten associates and you, Admiral Pike."

"Good. Keep it that way. You tell no one about her, understood?" Both doctors nodded. "Seal all files and evidence about her and I want to be notified the moment she shows signs of consciousness, understood?" They nodded once again. "Good. Now shut down this operation for now until I finish conversing with my superiors."

And with that, the admiral quickly turned on his heel and walked away from the chaos in the Med Center, the unconscious blonde girl a fading image n the background as doctors and nurses alike quickly began to lock down the ward and put away all their research and evidence. As Pike walked to the head office, his Communicator already in his hand as he called for an emergency meeting with the Board, he shook his head at the thought that he was convinced his day was going to be filled with boring paperwork. Who said that retiring from being Captain meant he didn't have to deal with any action?

–––

"So, you're telling me we have another time-traveler on our hands?" Admiral Barnett inquired as he, and the rest of Starfleet's Admirals (that were planet-side), sat around a white table in the middle of a discussion revolving around Pike and the Medical Staff's discovery about Amelia Alexis Proctor of the 21st century.

Though the question was aimed at no one in particular, all eyes were on Admiral Pike. He sighed before answering. "Based on the evidence we have found on her persons and the samples of her blood, the Medical Staff– and I, for that matter– believe that this girl is in fact a time-traveler of some sort." Admiralty across the table began to whisper among themselves, exchanging opinions and whispers of doubt as well as shock.

Admiral Archer was the first to speak after Pike's revelation. "Well, what are we supposed to do with an unconscious time-traveling teenager?"

"Lock her away," Admiral Price exclaimed from across the table. "If the incident with the Romulans has any indication about how dangerous time-travelers can be, than we should treat this girl like the threat she is. There are many different prison outposts across the Quadrant that can hold her securely." Another wave of whispers went across the room.

Pike couldn't believe what he was hearing. She was a teenage girl, not a dangerous alien species. She was from a century that had barely made it to the Moon with discussions of making it to Mars, she posed no threat as far as he could tell.

"With all due respect," Pike interjected. "The Romulans we faced were from decades into the future and had a vendetta against Starfleet and our Vulcan Commander Spock of the _U.S.S. Enterprise._ This girl is from centuries into the past and is only a teenager. I don't believe she poses as much as a threat as you believe, Admiral Price." The Admiral in question drew a face of offense, but Pike ignored it. "I think it's fair we give her the benefit of the doubt. Considering the high levels of drugs in her system, she clearly didn't have a say in her travels," he concluded.

"Admiral Pike makes a valid point," Admiral Barnett stated.

"Well, what about the undiscovered element in this girl's bloodstream?" Admiral Shang chimed in from a few seats away. "It was in your initial report that the Medical Staff discovered an unknown anomaly in her blood. They described it as 'advanced'. Are we to believe that this element should go overlooked?"

"No, it should not," Admiral Marcus exclaimed in his usual loud and booming voice that demanded attention and respect. "I believe that perhaps this element is a reason this girl was somehow brought upon the 23rd century. It should be investigated. I request that my scientific researchers take a look at her."

"I don't think what this girl needs is to be poked and prodded, Admiral Marcus," Pike stated, surprising even himself to be speaking to his close friend and respected colleague that way.

Admiral Marcus narrowed his eyes slightly at the man seated across from him. "Then what do you suggest, Admiral Pike?" He asked, in an almost condescending tone.

"New Vulcan," Pike answered matter-of-factly. He turned to Barnett and the other Admirals to explain. "There's another time-traveler that we forget is still among us stationed in New Vulcan. He runs a scientific team of researchers himself, studying ways for him to return to his time. I think it wise we send this girl to him. Perhaps trying to figure out how to get her to her correct time would be a better use of power than keeping her locked away in a cell experimenting on her." When Pike looked over to Admiral Marcus, he could see his friend trying to hide how truly upset he was with Pike's words. He tried not to think about it, knowing what he was doing was the right thing.

Admiral Barnett sighed from across the room. "I second Admiral Pike's request to send the time-traveling girl to New Vulcan. Whether she be a threat or not, I'd much rather have her and the dangers she poses with the new element in her blood back where they belong in her century."

"Well, how might we go about transporting her there?" Admiral Archer spoke again. "We can't just go around telling everyone aboard a ship about this girl. Soon enough, the element, as well as this girl, could get out and she would be in danger, as would Starfleet. She not only poses a threat to others, but also herself."

"So we send her covertly," Pike suggested. "We tell as few people about who she is and make them swear to secrecy. We can disguise her presence as a mission to resupply New Vulcan. Send a message to the science ambassadors there about what the real mission is. Get her in, get her out. Easy."

"Well, sounds like you have this all figured out, Admiral Pike," Admiral Price muttered bitterly. Pike, as usual, ignored him.

"Did you have a particular ship in mind to give this covert mission to, Admiral Pike?" Admiral Barnett asked.

The blonde Admiral smiled at his fellow admiralty before nodding. "Yes, I believe I do, sir."

–––

**May 18th, 2259**

**Starfleet Headquarters**

**San Francisco, California, U.S.A**

**Earth**

When Max woke up, it all felt... bright and... too warm, but also really cold and gross. She felt as though she could breath, but her chest was filled with cement. And she felt like she could move, but her body weighed a thousand tons. She opened her eyes slightly, but cringed and shut them again in reaction to how bright everything was. Who was shining a damn flashlight in her face?

"Oh, shit..." a soft voice cursed. It sounded like it was close, but Max couldn't tell through all the ringing in her ear and from how bright everything was and how suffocated she felt. "She's waking up!" The voice shouted, a lot closer this time. Max cringed and whined as she tried to get away from this loud person. Geez, this hangover was killer. She wondered how much she had drank last night.

Drank... Drink... Last night... What happened?

"_... make you a vodka tonic..."_

_"... go somewhere quieter..." _

_"... amazing this morning..." _

_"... so, beautiful..." _

_"... just like your mother..." _

"Agh!" Max jolted upright with a shout of terror as the events of the night before came back to her like a dam had been broken. The memories of the party in the woods, Wallace handing her a drink that tasted weird, the basement alone with him, slowly not being able to move, him talking about her mother. _What the fuck?! _

"She's awake, sir," that shouting voice Max recognized from earlier spoke somewhere in the distance. She immediately tensed. Where had Wallace brought her? Where was she? Had he hurt her? Sexually assaulted her? Kidnapped her? She had no answered, but she knew on thing: she was going to kick his ass. First, for drugging her, second, for mentioning her dead mom. He was so dead.

"What do you want me to do until then?" The voice asked to someone unseen and unheard. It was then that Max slowly began to take in her surroundings. A part of her expected to be knocked out half-naked on the same couch Wallace had drugged her on. But instead, it looked like she was in some sort of hospital. She was lying on a white hospital bed, a needle in her arm attached to those weird IV bags they gave you to numb the pain or some shit (she didn't know, she'd hardly ever been to hospitals outside of the times her brothers had to go for broken bones or her sisters had to go for illnesses). Around the weird hospital though, she noticed she didn't have her own room. In fact, there other empty beds like hers, only they were just that: empty. And also... looked oddly modern. Everything around her did– even the needle in her arm.

Wait a second, was this some sort of rich people hospital they took abducted girls to get them ready to be sold to some millionaire as a sex slave? Is that where Wallace took her?

"Talk to her? Okay... Okay, yeah, I can do that... Please, just, get here soon," the voice continued to speak, signaling to Max that she had a few moments before the voice returned from behind a corner to what looked like a possible exit.

Max's eyes darted around to try and find a way out of this. First off, she had to get that stupid needle out of her arm. It pinched for a moment, but she pushed through. After that, she jumped off the bed and moved her hand to her back pocket where she kept her knife... only to find it empty. _Shit! _

Where did her knife go? Did whoever was on the phone take it off of her? They left her clothes on was a release kind of a good sign. Max ran her hands over her stomach for any signs of stitches or sutures. Nothing. She let out a sigh of relief. _Cool, they didn't take my liver or kidneys to sell on the black market. _

But that still didn't give her much insight on where she was, who the person on the phone was or who they were talking to, what they planned on doing with her, how she got here, where Wallace was so she could murder him, or where her knife and other belongings were.

"Alright," the voice on the phone said as they wrapped up their call. "Goodbye, sir." Max shrugged to herself as she quickly walked beside the wall, waiting for the person to come out so she could attack. Looked like she had to punch her way out of this the regular way.

A few moments passed after the person on the phone had hung up with whoever they had been talking to. Max expected a weird burly guy in all black to walk out, or even some weird doctor with rubber gloves, boots, and goggles to come sauntering from behind the wall. But instead, she was caught off guard to find a man dressed in an all white uniform she didn't recognize, his hair slicked back with thick-rimmed glasses perched on the edge of his nose that almost fell off when he abruptly halted in his steps the moment his eyes landed across the room to find the bed Max had once been lying in empty. Despite his odd attire, the blonde still charged the minute she knew he wasn't expecting it.

"Mm!" She groaned as she elbowed the weirdly dressed man in white against the back of his head.

"Agh!" He shouted in pain as he bellowed over, clutching the back of his head.

Max used this motion to grip his wrist and pull his hand the rest of the way behind his head, looping her other hand through his elbow and locking her arm around his neck. Once she had him where she wanted him, she kicked the back of his right leg and watched him fall down to his knees, directly into her chokehold. He waved and thrashed widely, but it had no effect on the military trained girl who wasn't even phased by his attempts to escape her clutches. "Where am I?!" She growled into his ear. "_Tell me!_"

The man in white continued to choke on his words, so Max gave him a bit of air by releasing him ever so slightly. He coughed a few times before he wheezed an answer, "A medical... center... in San Francisco..."

San Francisco? How the hell did she get from Honolulu to San Francisco? What had Wallace done to her? Which... brought her back to that. "Where's Wallace?" Max barked at the man in her chokehold.

"W-who?" He coughed.

"Wallace. Wallace Price. The guy who drugged me. Where is he?!" She shouted.

"I-I don't know," the doctor wheezed. "I-I swear. We-we found you unconscious... on the South Lawn of our facility..."

South Lawn? Facility? Where the hell was she? "What facility? Where am I?" She growled, tightening her elbow's lock around his throat.

The doctor choked and coughed more and more, his face turning more blue by the minute. "I... I..."

"_Where_?!"

"Please release the doctor, Miss Proctor."

Max froze at the sound of her name being called from behind her. Max's arm retracted from around the man in white's neck before she spun around in a defensive position facing whoever it was that called her by her name.

It was a man. He was dressed somewhat similarly to the man in white, his uniform looked the same, but a bit more... militaristic. Was that where she was? A military base? If so, which one? She definitely didn't recognize the style, the grey colors, or the odd arrow-like symbol pinned on the breast of his uniform.

The man had blond-ish, white-ish hair, striking blue eyes, slightly aged Caucasian skin, and a cane he had holding him up. He didn't look like he posed a threat, but from the fact that he knew her name, Max felt otherwise. "Who are you? How do you know my name?" She demanded.

"My name is Admiral Christopher Pike of Starfleet. And I know your name because it was printed on the ID we found in your pocket when you were brought in," the man explained in a calm and collected voice.

Max's eyebrows furrowed at the first but of information the man gave her. "Starfleet? What branch of military is that?"

"We're a non-militaristic organization. We focus more on exploration, scientific discoveries, and peace among the planets," Admiral Christopher Pike explained, watching as Max's face contorted into even more confusion.

"'Peace among the planets'? What kind of crack are you putting in you cereal, _Admiral_?" Max shot back. "Look, I don't know what game you're playing, but my father is a very important man in the U.S. military, so if you don't let me out of this weird ass medical facility, I promise you, he will burn this place to the ground... And that's if I don't do it first."

The Admiral remained calm after her threat. In fact, he looked almost amused as a small smirk tugged at the edge of his mouth. "I'm afraid I can't let you leave, Miss Proctor."

Max felt her heart plummet at the thoughts that circulated in her head. Was she going to be killed? Tortured? Held for ransom? Why wasn't this guy letting her leave? Why wasn't he taking the threat about her father seriously? "Why the hell not?" Max retorted, a small crack in her voice giving away her fear.

"Because I have a feeling you're going to want answers. And we're the only people who can give them to you... mostly," the Admiral explained.

Max raised an eyebrow. It was if every time he answered a question, he raised about fifty new ones for her to ask. "Answers to what?"

"How you got here."

"In a medical facility in San Francisco, hundreds of miles away from my home in Hawaii?" She questioned rather bitterly. "A plane after I got drugged might be a good guess."

"Try a time machine, Miss Proctor." Max looked completely lost now. A time machine? What the hell was this man on?

Pike could clearly see her lack of trust in his words and smiled. He expected she wouldn't believe him. Then, without warning, the man began to walk over to where a large shade covered where mot of the sunlight was coming from against a floor to ceiling window. With a tap of his finger against the shade, a weird sensation pulsed and it retracted as if it had been in the glass the entire time. Like... nanotechnology or something. But that wasn't the weirdest thing. No, not by a long shot, because outside the window sat the city skyline of a city she didn't recognize.

It was a city filled with high skyscrapers the stretched for miles against the horizon. It was a city filled with levitating ships in the sky and floating cars. It was a city filled with odd creatures with colored skins and weird fashion. It was a city full of wonder, oddity, and futuristic technology and culture. It was a city from the future...

"Holy shit..." Max breathed in awe at the world in front of her. She was starting to believe she wasn't in Kansas anymore.

"Welcome to the year 2259, Miss Proctor."

•••

**_A/N: Welcome to the official second chapter of the story. Hope you're liking it so far. This chapter we get a bit of hindsight into Pike's life after the Narada incident and also the lasting affects its had on Starfleet. And we see Max officially waking up in this new world._**

**_A side note: I know the Khan incident and Into Darkness plot takes place in 2259, but I'm moving it back a while and giving a large gap between the Nero Incident and Khan Incident, like... a three year gap. _**

**_Next chapter: more of Max adjusting to this news. _**


	4. III

**_Chapter Three: The Cup Is Half Full; The Cup Is Half Empty; and Who Gives A Shit, It's Just A Fucking Cup_**

**_•••_**

**May 18th, 2259**

**Starfleet Headquarters**

**San Francisco, California, U.S.A**

**Earth**

–––

"Welcome to the year 2259, Miss Proctor."

_2259\. 2259. 2259. _

_The future. The future. The future. _

The words kept ringing in Max's ears ever since she saw what was outside: the blunt truth that hit her like the rock Cain killed Abel with. She was in the _fucking future. _Like, Marty McFly, _'Back to the Future' _type shit.

Max let out a heavy sigh as her hands came to work their way into the roots of her blonde hair, pulling them as if they were her life line to stay grounded to the floor. She didn't believe this. She couldn't. How could she believe this? The future? The actual, _real-life _future.

_2259\. 2259. 2259. _

"Holy shit." _Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit! _"H-holy shit."

Beside her, she could practically feel that Admiral Christopher Pike guy watching her like a lab rat inside a cage. That's what she was, wasn't it? A god damn experiment gone wrong?! But how did she end up here? Here, of all places? The future?

Being drugged and sexually assaulted by some douchebag, she could handle that. It happened to women all around the world and Max knew that when she would come to she wouldn't be alone in bringing that asshat, Wallace, to justice. But this– traveling two centuries to the future... She was completely and utterly alone. She had no friends to guide her– Kim, Lee, or Adrian. She had no family to lean on– Sal, Mick, Marcus, Abby, Roz, her Dad. She was alone.

What was she gonna do? She had to get back. There had to be a way back, right? _Right? _

"Miss Proctor–"

"It's _Max!_" She snapped at him subconsciously. It had been ticking her off more and more each time he kept calling her that proper name. 'Miss Proctor' reminded her of the Hag at school. She didn't need that. Not right now in the midst of her mid-life crisis she was having at the ripe age of eighteen right now.

Well, actually, she was technically two centuries old. Making this mid-life crisis a bit overdue by a few centuries, give or take.

"_Max_," Admiral Christopher Pike amended generously. "I don't know how you must be feeling right now. But, I can assure you we're taking every action we can to make sure you get back to your right time." Max didn't answer. She couldn't. Her mouth could barely move to articulate the many curse words she was repeating over and over again in her head.

_Fuck! Shit! Dammit! Motherfucker! Dickwad! Douchebag! Asshat! Fucking shit! Asshole! Bitch! Slut! Crap! _

"Miss– Max, can you hear me?"

Max shut her eyes. She kept reminding herself to breathe. Why couldn't she breathe? It felt like a ton of bricks was constricting around her lungs and throat and her heart felt like it was going a million miles an hour and pounding in each and every one of her skin cells. Why was it so loud? Why was she in the future? Why did she go to that basement alone with Wallace? Why didn't she say bye to her siblings, Sal, and her Dad before she left? Why did she have to be such a stubborn bitch all the time?

"Max!" Suddenly, two strong hands were on her shoulders, shaking her back to reality where she found herself slumped against the hospital bed she had been lying in earlier. She was on the floor and she hadn't even remembered falling down. And her eyes were filled with tears and her nose kept sniffling and her body kept shaking. Why couldn't she stop shaking? _Stop shaking! _"Max!"

Max blinked away the tears in her eyes and focused in the blue eyes of Admiral Christopher Pike to keep her composure together. If not for herself, then for him. She couldn't be seen crying. Not in front of him, not in front of anyone. She was strong. She wasn't weak. "Yes?" She whimpered.

Admiral Christopher Pike let out a heavy sigh as he glanced between her and the doctor she had almost choked out a few yards away. "Bring her some water, will you, Dr. Winters?" Max heard footsteps, but didn't bother to watch 'Dr. Winters' leave. She was too busy trying to steady her breathing and stop shaking. She tried counting her breaths, but kept losing track and would start panicking again. So, she just focused on song stuck in her head.

_Mama, ooh-ooh-ooh... Didn't mean to make you cry. If I'm not back again this time tomorrow, carry on, carry on, as if nothing really matters... _

Max hadn't even realized it, but minutes had passed since her moment of panic and Dr. Winters was back with a cup of water he handed to Admiral Christopher Pike, who, of course, handed it to Max. She numbly took it in her hands, but didn't move, so Pike had to raise the cup to her lips for her to drink. She did, and didn't stop until the cup was empty. She hadn't realized she was so damn parched.

Once she was finished drinking her water, she handed the empty cup back to Admiral Christopher Pike who set it aside to grab ahold of her arms. "Why don't we get you off the ground, huh?" Max didn't really answer, but next thing she knew, two sets of strong hands were lifting her from off the shiny tile ground and back onto the weird bed she had once been laying in.

After seating her, Admiral Christopher Pike took a seat himself in a nearby chair. He set his cane to the side and sat forward to get a better look at Max as she continued to slowly calm herself down. After a few minutes, Pike spoke. "Max," he paused. She didn't respond in any way. "Are you alright, now?"

The blonde, with her head still bowed and eyes still closed, nodded. "'M fine," she mumbled, almost incoherently beneath her breath. "So..." she paused momentarily to clear her throat of all hoarseness in her voice. "So, what were you saying earlier about... space and non-military and timelines?"

Admiral Christopher Pike spared her a small amused smirk before reverting back to his serious expression and explaining, "You somehow managed to travel over two hundred years into the future-"

Max scoffed. "Yeah. I noticed." Pike gave her a look of disapproval, and for a split second, Max thought she was speaking to her Dad. "... Sorry," she mumbled an apology.

The Admiral sighed before continuing. "We're not sure how you managed to do so– or rather, who managed to do this to you– but, I can promise we here at Starfleet will do everything we can to return you home."

The blonde, whose eyes had been glued to the bottom of her empty cup the entirety of his explanation, finally glanced up into his striking blue eyes. He had eyes like hers, maybe a bit more ocean colored. Her mother always told her she had icy blue eyes, but Max just called the, blue marble eyes. Pike had Atlantic ocean, Fiji eyes. And just like Fiji, Max found that they were warm and welcoming.

From this evaluation from his eyes, Max concluded that he was telling the truth about helping her get home. The only question then was– "How?"

Admiral Christopher Pike looked rather conflicted with the next words that left his mouth. "I'm not entirely sure," he admitted truthfully. Max opened her mouth to either start ranting, cursing, or panicking, but Pike was quick to intervene. "But," he interjected with an explanation. "The Federation and Starfleet have close ties to another time-traveling person on another planet who is willing to help figure out how to return you to where you belong."

Pike watched as the teenage girl's eyes comically grew the size of saucers. Her mouth opened and closed more times than he could count and her eyes kept darting between him, the window, and Dr. Winters a few yards away. "I... I..." she stammered. "Hold on, did you say '_another planet_'?!" She asked incredulously, finally finding her voice again. "As in, you're trying to send me into space? Like, _space _space. In the sky... Into the void of vastness... Elon Musk... The Martian... space?"

Dr. Winters couldn't help the laugh that bubbled up from his chest that he had been holding in. But, after both Pike and the blonde girl threw him unamused and slightly aggravated looks, he was quick to bottle it up again.

Admiral Christopher Pike turned back to her and nodded. "Yes. That space."

Max had trouble processing that but of information. Space. Like, actual, real life, space. "Don't I... D-don't I need, like, training or something? Am I even authorized to just be sent to another planet? Do I need clearance? A passport-"

"Max," the Admiral cut off her panicked ramblings. She clamped her mouth shut, but her eyes were still wide and full of questions. "You won't need anything. Starfleet has already cleared you to be transferred from Earth to New Vulcan. The only thing we need from you is discretion."

Max raised an eyebrow. "Discretion? Like... Like a covert operation?" Military stuff. Now this was something she understood.

The Admiral pursed his lips and nodded. "Something similar to that, yes," he replied.

"But, why is transferring me covert? I'm just a person," Max pointed out in a bland tone. "I travelled here from the past. I didn't even know what Starfleet was until you kind of explained it to me earlier. I doubt I would even know what a microwave looks like in this time, let alone how to use it. Why am I precious cargo?"

Pike sighed. She made a good point. It was beginning to made sense she was so smart, she was apart of a military family in her time. The time could change, and so could the people. But the military way of recognizing your position and analyzing it didn't seem to change all too much.

He had an inner debate with himself earlier before getting to this point. He was torn on whether or not to tell Miss Proctor why she was so important. The time-travel thing aside, that was. One part of him knew she had the right to know about the particle coursing through her veins. But, the other part of him– the Admiralty part of him– knew that if he told her the truth, there was no telling how she would react or who she would tell. This operation was covert for a reason, and they couldn't risk anyone knowing about the unknown, possibly dangerous or Eugenic, element in this girl's blood. Even her.

But, ultimately, the other, more reasonable side, of Pike won this battle. Sitting there now, in front of Amelia Proctor, he knew that she did think like a soldier, a commander even. She had it in her to understand what discretion meant, what the risk of a covert operation meant. And the more reasonable side of him trusted her. And it had partial reason to due with the fact that as he stared into those familiar blue eyes of hers, he saw someone else. Someone he trusted with his life, and had trusted with his own life.

He could trust Amelia Proctor. Just like he had trust in Jim Kirk.

"It's your blood," Pike answered Max after almost a minute of inner turmoil. Max furrowed her eyebrows in confusion, and he continued. "While we were running tests on the drugs in your system, we found a factor in your bloodstream and DNA we did not recognize. Something we could not understand."

Max looked perplexed, yet understanding as she rubbed a hand on her elbow crease where the needle of the IV they had hooked her to once had been. "Something from my time?"

Pike shook his head. "It wasn't ancient... It was advanced."

Max looked just as confused as he had been when he first heard the news. The Admiral could practically see the millions of wheels and gears shifting and spinning in her head, trying to work this out as to how it could be even remotely possible. "M-maybe... Maybe the person that brought me here put it in me," she reasoned.

Pike nodded. "That could be a possibility. But, until we find out what it is, we have no way of knowing for sure how it got there." Max bowed her head, as if accepting this fate. "Which brings us back to the discretion I was talking about." Max looked back up at him as he stood from his chair with the help of his cane. "You are going to be one of the only people in the universe who knows about this mission. You are to speak to no one about who you are, where you're from, where you're going, or the reason you are going there. Someone asks you about it, you lie. As far as anyone is concerned, you're a nobody, born May 13th, 2241, from Hawaii on Earth. You are going to New Vulcan as a Starfleet Specialist, assigned to protect medical cargo being transported to said planet..."

Admiral Christopher Pike took a step towards Max and stared her down with those boring Atlantic Ocean, Fiji blue eyes. "Is that understood?"

Max wasn't deterred or intimidated by his show of power or boasting of his chest, but she understood clearly. It was a mission. Her mission, and she couldn't have been more simultaneously scared and excited than she had been in her entire life. This was what she had been working towards. Missions, the military. Just like her Mom and Dad. Sure, it was a few centuries later, but, hey, it was still her dream come true.

Pike watched with curious eyes as the blonde girl stood up straight and tall, her chest boasted, her arms to her sides, and her eyes boring right back into his. And when she spoke, she spoke loud and clear. "Yes, Admiral. I understand completely, sir."

The Admiral felt a swell of pride, almost admiration, at hearing and seeing this young girl cooperate so easily. She had been misplaced centuries into the future, and miles frm the only home she had. She had had a panic attack only minutes ago after waking up and hearing the news. And yet, after all that, she was calm, collected, and ready for her orders. Like a soldier– no. A Starfleet Officer.

A smile threatened to peak out of Pike's hard exterior as he stared down the blonde still. But, he noticed a small smug smirk peaking out of her's. Pike chuckled at that. _Oh yeah_, he thought to himself. _There's definitely some Jim Kirk potential in there. _

"At ease, Proctor." Max dropped her stiff stance with a smile. Pike returned the gesture, turning his head to glance back at the doctor a few yards away. "Dr. Winters, have your nurses bring back Miss Proctor's belongings and a new pair of clothes more... fit for this era of time," he remarked, throwing a quick look of judgement at Max's odd choice of wardrobe.

"Yes, Admiral," Dr. Winters answered as he scurried off, while Max drew a mildly offended look at Pike's minor insult of her clothing.

"What's wrong with TLC?" Max asked as she studied her slightly charred clothing.

Pike merely chuckled as he replied, "Believe me when I tell you, no one's heard a single song from whoever that is in a long, long time. It would be fitting if you just stuck to regular clothing... No graphic shirts or references to old bands."

The blonde rolled her eyes in regular teenage-fashion. "Oh, come on. I live for band tees... I can't even listen to a single old song? Not even on my phone?" She asked just as two nurses in white uniforms entered, one holding a box of clear bags and the other holding a stack of clothing and a pair of shoes. They set it all down on the bed beside Max before being dismissed with a single nod from Pike.

Max didn't bother to wait for Pike's word before tearing into the box of her belongings, ripping them out of the bags an pocketing everything: her wallet, her earphones, her Gerber knife, and her lighter. But, after it was all out away, she realized something was missing. "Hey, where's my phone?" She asked the Admiral. "I mean, I know it's a bit... old school, but I can just play it off like I'm into retro stuff, or something."

Pike shrugged. "We didn't find you with a phone on your persons... Whoever brought you here must've taken it," he concluded.

"And my ring, too?" She asked, her voice sounding frantic as her fingers moved to clutch her right hand where Pike assumed the ring she was talking about must've been. "I had a ring, my mom gave it to me. It had sentimental value. Did I have it with me?" She asked, a panicked look in her eye.

With a heavy heart, the Admiral shook his head. "I'm afraid not. I'm sorry."

Max let out a heavy sigh, her hands clenching into fists as she closed her eyes and tried not to focus on it too much. "It's okay," she bit out through gritted teeth. Her fists quickly unclenched and her jaw unclamped as she counted her steady breaths. "It's okay... Just another thing I'm going to be peeling off of the dead body of whoever did this to me," she stated, a deadly look in her eye as she discarded the empty box and turned to the stack of clothes she had been given.

Admiral Christopher Pike nodded to her as he started to walk out. "I'll leave you to change," he told her. "Meet me in the lobby once you're finished."

Max didn't bother to respond, but she watched as he left. Once no one was in sight, Max picked up the pieces of clothing she had been given. The first thing she had noticed was the colors... or, rather, lack thereof. It was a navy blue jumpsuit with spaghetti straps and baggy pants, accompanied by a large, baggy grey, wool cardigan. _Damn, was the future culture this depressing? _She wondered to herself before reluctantly stripping off her burnt clothing and putting on the new clothes.

Once she was dressed, Max took a glance at the shoes the nurses had left and nearly guffawed. They were nude sandals. Nude. Sandals. _Oh, like hell. _If there was one thing Max hated more than herself and all her stubbornness, it was shitty footwear.

Her Mom had taught her from a young age that she had to be able to adapt to her situation as best she could. Meaning, no matter where she was, how she felt, what the circumstances were, or what she was wearing, she had to be able to either fight or flight. Meaning, there were certain things Max tended to avoid. Like, dark alleys, crowded spaces, being naked, being without at least one weapon on hand, and sandals. It was simple really: they were hard to run in and impossible to fight in without them flying off and throwing you off focus. Heels, Max could handle. But sandals? No way.

So, Admiral Christopher Pike was both amused and surprised when the blonde came to the lobby dressed in the jumpsuit and cardigan, but with the added bonus of her black heeled boots she had been found in. "Ready to go?"

She nodded, shoving her hands into the jumpsuit's pockets as they left the large medical building lobby glass doors, into the outside world of the future. It was a lot to take in for Max as she looked at the horizon full of large futuristic buildings, flying space ships in the sky, and levitating cars, but she managed to not look like she was in complete awe as she kept up with Pike's pace down the large stair entrance. "Where are we going?" She asked once they made it to the silver car parked at the street. Max tried not to think about the fact the car was floating off the ground a foot in the air as the door unlocked and she climbed in, Pike walking around to the driver's side and climbing in as well.

"To lunch," the Admiral answered her, a small hint of humor in his tone as he pressed a button, the seat belts coming out of the seat and wrapping around them to secure them properly. Max gasped, but didn't panic.

"No, seriously," she persisted after her minor nerd moment with the seat belt.

Pike started the car and explained, "I am serious. We're going out to a favorite spot of mine. A bit old fashioned, but I figure you might appreciate that. They also have some amazing fries you should try, I-" Pike cut himself off when he noticed the blonde's unamused look from across from him. He laughed, noting she wasn't one for jokes when it came to 'missions'. "Alright. We're going to meet with the man in charge of the starship transporting you from Earth to the science reserve on New Vulcan. The Captain, actually."

Max's eyebrows furrowed as the car pulled away from the side of the street and started down the road towards the main freeway to get into the city. "Who is he?"

—–—

**May 17th, 2259**

**U.S.S. Enterprise**

**Somewhere In The Alpha Quadrant**

–––

"_JIM_!" A loud shout echoed throughout what seemed like the entirety of the ship.

The blonde haired, blue-eyed Captain tried not to focus on the close proximity of said voice as he continued to dash through the long halls, searching frantically for a place to hide. "Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit..." he cursed to himself as he ran towards the open hallway leading to the Mess Hall. Few crew members all dressed in the red, yellow, and blue uniforms paid much mind to the odd scene in front of them. They all knew why the Captain was running through the halls of his own ship. And they all knew from whom he was running from.

"_Jim Kirk_!" The booming voice shouted again, this time, even closer.

"Shit," the Captain cursed breathlessly. He looked around at his surroundings before quickly dashing through a second exit from the Mess Hall. If he couldn't hide in the cafeteria, he could sure as hell try hiding in the science bay. Hopefully the science officers wouldn't mind hiding him until his CMO finally gave up on trying to wrangle him to Sickbay for his monthly Physical.

It had become a common occurrence aboard the _Enterprise _when Captain Kirk's physical came around where the crew would find a sight like today's where the Captain would go running about the ship, searching for a place to hide from the Chief Medical Officer who would go to the ends of the Earth just to give Jim a single hypo. The Captain would swear up and down that the man was addicted to stabbing him in the neck with those things and had to be stopped. Of course, everyone was too scared of the Doctor to even try.

Jim skidded to a stop once inside the hydroponics bay, just below the main science deck. He figured he could try hiding in the enormous garden and hopefully Bones wouldn't find him. He felt safe if only for a moment as he decided to walk amongst the many species of plant life growing in the garden. It had t be one of Jim's favorite places on the ship to just relax... Second to, of course, his Chair on the Bridge. He loved that thing.

But, the feeling of safety was fleeting when Jim noticed a certain helmsman of his watering a large alien bulb of sorts. He tried to sneak away knowing damn well his helmsman would immediately report him to the CMO, but it was too late. As soon as he made a move to leave, he heard Sulu call after him, "Captain Kirk."

Jim froze and cringed. Slowly, he turned back to face the helmsman, a bright smile replacing the grimace on his face as he beamed up at his pilot. "Mr. Sulu," Jim greeted him. "I didn't expect you to be away from your post."

Sulu merely smiled back to the Captain, an amused glint in his eye. He nodded slowly. "You're hiding from Dr. McCoy again, aren't you?"

"Dammit," Jim whined. "How'd you know?"

Sulu laughed. "The Doctor sent out a ship wide memo notifying everyone that if they tried to help you escape from your monthly physical he would personally see to them being marked as unfit for duty and be confined to their quarters until shore leave next month," the helmsman explained. "Everyone sort of just acknowledged it after Mr. Scott tried hiding you in his distillery in Engineering last month... I think that was warning enough."

Jim cringed again, remembering having to hear the Scottsman curse on and on in Sickbay about all the damn hypos Bones had stabbed him with after they had both conspired in escaping the physical. He vowed never to let Jim near Engineering during that time of the month and didn't talk to the CMO for months after he had been given a shot that inhibited him from getting drunk or tasting alcohol. Needless to say, he was a bit pissed.

"You're not planning on reporting me to him, are you?" Jim asked his pilot hesitantly.

Just then, the sound of the hydroponics bay entrance hissing open made Jim's heart plummet. His eyes darted through the shrubs of the garden to find the sight of his close friend and CMO of his ship striding in. The Captain turned to give Sulu a look of hurt and betrayal. The helmsman shrugged. "I'm sorry Captain. He was quite persuasive."

Jim barely had time to acknowledge the fencing pilot as he dashed past him towards the second exit. The echoes of his CMO's shouts and curses acting as a fuel to drive to Captain further down the long hallways of the ship toward the lift. Hopefully Scotty had had a change of heart and would let him hide out in his office this time.

But, of course, Jim was clearly mistaken, because when the yellow-shirt wandered in as if nothing was wrong, Scotty and Chekov were quick to run over, already trying to push him out. "Oh, no, no, no, no. No. No!" The Scottsman protested as he stopped Jim from walking even a foot more into Engineering.

Jim threw his hands up in exasperation. "Oh, come on, Scotty. Can't I just hide in your office for a few hours?"

"Absolutely not, Captain," the CEO shook his head frantically. "I'll not be go'ng 'gainst the wrath of that hypo-crazy doctor for you again, Jim-Bo. You must be crazy te think I'd'a helped you 'gain after what happened last time."

Jim rolled his eyes. _Here we go again. _Sometimes Jim wondered who ran the ship: him or his command crew.

During this whole ordeal, the young Russian Whiz Kid, Pavel Chekov, looked very confused. "Vat happened de last time?" He asked, glancing between his Captain and his CEO-slash-mentor.

"Nothing," both Jim and Scotty replied in unison.

"Please, Scotty," Jim continued to beg. "Just this once-"

"No. No. No. Absolutely not-"

"Please, Scotty-"

"-I will not be violated again-"

"-I promise Bones doesn't mean any harm-"

Scotty scoffed. "Tell that to my taste buds that ha' been deprived of the glorious taste o' liquor for three straight months. _Three. Straight. Months._"

"Look, I'm sorry about the liquor thing-"

"_Jim_!"

The Captain spun around on his heel to find his Chief Medical Officer with a hypo in hand, _right behind him_. "Shit-!" Jim cursed before spinning back around and starting for the second exit in Engineering. But, unfortunately, Dr. McCoy was determined to drag his friend to Sickbay if it was the last thing he did. Jim was abruptly jerked back by the back collar of his yellow command shirt. "GAH-!"

"Yeah, not so fast," the Doctor grumbled, his fist tightening around his friend's shirt.

"Dammit, Bones," Jim groaned as he was yanked along through Engineering, all of his Engineering crew watching while trying to hide their smiles. This couldn't have gotten any more embarrassing as the CMO continued to drag his Captain all the way through halls and decks until they finally reached Sickbay where he shoved Jim haphazardly onto a nearby biobed. The Captain nearly fell over, but quickly regained his balance... Only to be stabbed in the neck with a hypospray. "Ow. Bones, c'mon!"

"Don't '_Bones_' me, kid," the Doctor snapped in retaliation as he began to snap white gloves onto his hands. "You've been trying to skip out on physicals since you first began to give me headaches at the Academy. But, I can promise that you sure as hell ain't gettin' out of this one, pal."

"Mm," the Captain pouted like a five-year-old, crossing his arms as he cringed away from the Doctor's cold hands as they began to pick and probe at his arms. "Just make it quick." McCoy rolled his eyes. Jim stiffened, preparing for having to get practically assaulted by one of his closest friends, only for the intercom to come on.

"_Captain Kirk, incoming transmission from Admiral Pike,_" Liuetenant Uhura's voice rang through the Medbay.

An excited grin spread across Jim's face as he smiled up at the Doctor pausing his examination to groan. "Oh, you've got to be kiddin' me."

Meanwhile, Jim happily hopped off of the biobed as he called back, "Transfer message to my ready room, Liuetenant."

"_Yes, Captain._"

"Well," Jim clasped his hands together. "It seems I'm being summoned."

The Doctor glared at his Captain as he began to tear off his latex gloves, watching as Jim bounded– practically skipped– out of Sickbay. "Lucky little bastard," he grumbled.

–––

When Jim entered his ready room, he was greeted by a holographic screening of none other than his sponsor, and friend, Christopher Pike. "Captain Pike," Jim greeted the man with a broad smile. "Sorry– _Admiral _Pike," he corrected with a smirk. It had been only a few months since Jim relieved his former Captain of his duty, taking over the _Enterprise _after the Nero Incident almost a year ago.

The holographic Admiral looked like he wanted to roll his eyes at the Captain's lame joke he'd used almost every time they spoke, but instead settled for a small nod. "Captain Kirk," he greeted him. "I hear you and your crew are doing well. I also heard about your Chief Engineer getting bombarded by multiple hyposprays from your Chief Medical Officer after you attempted to escape a monthly physical. Is my intel correct?"

Jim tilted his head in confusion. "How did you...?"

"Mr. Spock and I still converse from time to time," Pike explained with an amused smile. "Mr. Scott also filed a complaint, but was quick to retract it once he realized he would need to disclose his... brewing activities aboard your ship."

Jim kept a stoic face while he replied, "I'm afraid I'm not sure what activities you're talking about."

Pike rolled his eyes this time. "Calm down, Jim. I'm not here to bust you for the distillery in your Engineering Deck," the Admiral explained. "I'm here to give you your next assignment, courtesy of Starfleet."

Jim's eyebrows rose as excitement brewed inside his chest. Oh, how he loved a good mission. "Well, my crew and I are ready to face whatever you have for us, Admiral."

"How about a shore leave to discuss the matter further and more... privately," Pike suggested.

Jim didn't not catch the hollowness in his voice when he spoke the last part of his statement. He could tell Pike was hiding something and it had something to do with this mission. "Is everything alright, Pike?"

"Everything's fine, Jim," the Admiral assured him. "This particular mission just requires... discretion." Jim narrowed his eyes, not bothering to ask all the thousands of questions jumbled inside his head right now. "Our usual meeting place will suffice when you return. I'll leave you to notifying your crew of your early shore leave. I'm sure they'll be relieved to finally get off that ship after already a few months of you as their Captain," he joked with a knowing smile.

Jim scoffed and rolled his eyes. "I'll have you know my crew adores me," he retorted.

"Is that why your CMO is constantly having to hand out headache medicine to your crew when you have longer than normal missions, Captain?" He asked smugly. Jim chuckled. "I'll be seeing you, Jim. Safe travels."

Jim nodded at his old mentor and friend just before the hologram disappeared, leaving Jim alone to wonder to himself what kind of missin his crew would be assigned to have Pike acting so... odd.

Little did he know what waited for him back on Earth in the form of a blonde haired, blue-eyed scoundrel, much like himself.

•••

**_A/N: Okay, Star Trek: Discovery officially has its claws in me now. I'm calling it. After I've binged a season and a half in two days, I have concluded that I'm officially addicted to it and will now die for each and every character. Well, aside from Ash... I actually kind of don't like him. Michael deserves better. _**

**_So, yeah. If you see any references to the show or it's characters, that's why I've also decided to write this Pike as a bit more of the Pike from Discovery because I just love him so damn much. Not that I don't love the AOS Pike, I just love this one... ya know, more. I also really wish AOS hadn't killed off Amanda, I would've loved to have her and Max meet in the future because I jut love her so damn much. _**

**_Anyway, hope you enjoyed. Read and review... Or don't, that's cool too, I guess. It's not like I need validation from strangers... I do, actually, I really do. _**


	5. IV

_**Chapter 4: Things Tend To Change When You're Over 200 Years Old **_

**•••**

**May 18th, 2259**

**Downtown San Francisco, California, U.S.A**

**Earth**

–––

"Where are we?" Max wondered aloud as Admiral Christopher Pike ("It's just Pike") pulled the hovering car up to the curb of a tall looking building on a busy street in the downtown area of an unrecognizable city filled to the brim with alien species, hovering cars, weird outfits, crazy technology, and even crazier architecture. It was all a lot to take in for a girl who just woke up two centuries out of her time.

Admiral Pike put the car in park as he unbuckled his seat belt with the press of a button. "A restaurant. It has a more classic theme. Thought it would be best since you're still processing everything."

"Classic?" Max questioned as she clambered out of the hovering car, right behind Pike as he walked up the sidewalk towards the two glass doors in front of what looked like a dive-like restaurant with big, blinking letters up above the entrance: _Barney's Bar. _"Barney's?" Max furrowed her eyebrows in skepticism as Pike held the glass door open for her.

"They have great burgers here," the Admiral merely shrugged as he followed in after her.

Inside, Max found it to be actually quite similar to the bar she worked in back in Honolulu. Of course, the bar she worked at had less of a mid-western vibe and more of a beach-y aesthetic (like most of the stores and establishments on the island). _Barney's _had dark wood flooring, pool tables in the back, a bar with wooden stools to the left of the entrance, and even an odd futuristic device that resembled a jukebox. But, still, there were things that reminded Max that this wasn't her time. Like the odd looking holographic spheres in the middle of each table with the name of whatever song was being played circulating it in letters. Max didn't recognize the music either. It sounded like a combination of EDM, pop, and country music. She wasn't really sure if she liked it or not.

Pike studied the teenage girl as they entered the bar. He watched her facial expressions and body language, trying to make sure she didn't have another panic attack like she had had at the Medical Building. Luckily, she seemed to be doing alright. The blonde seemed a bit more curious and in awe than she did overwhelmed or scared.

After seating themselves in the back near a few pool tables, the blonde turned to look at them. If there was something she was good at, it was pool. But... they weren't exactly pool tables. They had holographic balls on the counter with weird marks on the green counter and even more pockets. It was some mutated game of pool Max didn't even want to try to figure out. _How could somebody change pool_?!

As she continued to glance around the 'old school' bar, she kept seeing things that were very much not old school. The menus, the weird pool, the holographic in the middle of the table, this shit music, that weird jukebox, the odd beverages at the bar, the floating television screens, the different skinned and textured people walking around, the odd sense of fashion everyone in the bar seemed to have.

"Wow," the blonde muttered as she took a seat at the table across from Pike. "This is..."

"A lot?" Pike questioned.

Max scoffed. "Yeah," she nodded, her voice hitching a bit in her answer. Everything around her was all so bright and in her face. Every which way she turned to look, something different and new was there. There was not a lot that stayed the same from her time.

Feeling a bit overwhelmed, Max decided to stop scanning the room and to just stick to focusing on Pike and the wooden table and the completely normal menu in front of her. But, something caught her eye when she lifted up the menu in her hand. "Are these pictures moving?" She asked, baffled.

Pike chuckled as he nodded. "Yes. They are."

Max wasn't really sure how to respond to that, so she just stuck to, "Huh." Trying to ignore the quick-paced rate the blinking images on the menu were moving, Max decided to take a page out of Pike's book and skim through the items on the menu to try and find something to eat. After all, she was kind of hungry. Who knew getting roofied and dropped 200 years into the future gave you a mild case of the Munchies? But, as the blonde was looking through the menu items (recognizing familiar food names and dishes) she noticed something kind of odd. There were no prices.

"Hey, uh, do we just ask the waiter how much everything is? Or are the prices on the back, or something?" Max asked, shutting the menu and trying to look everywhere on the small booklet where the prices were.

Pike glanced up at her as he set his own menu aside. "There are no prices," he explained.

"What?" Her eyes shot up to meet his, her eyebrows furrowing in confusion. "You mean... everything here is free? Seriously?"

"Well, after Replicator technology was introduced, it became quite easy for people to just make new money. Which eventually led to normal currency losing its value. Now we rely mostly on credit–" Max watched as Pike pulled out a card that reminded her a lot of the debit and credit cards they had back in her time. "Which is used all across the worlds."

When Pike had finished his explanation, Max wasn't sure how to feel. There was no money, there was a different version of pool, there was 'Replicator technology', there were spaceships, there were other species of aliens, moving menus, holographic TV's, levitating cars, and basically a UN for the galaxy. This was... this was insane. She should've expected that a lot would change in over 200 years, but not all at once in the span of a single night for her.

Max suddenly began to feel as though she was suffocating in the small bar. It felt like two balloons were being squeezed inside her lungs and rubbed against each other and the static electricity kept building, and building, and building. She felt like a time bomb, bound to blow up at any moment. And the electricity just kept building, and building, and building, and building- "I need to use the restroom. C-can I just... go to the restroom? I'll be right back."

Max abruptly stood from her seat and walked towards where a bathroom sign hung in the corner of the bar, leaving Pike looking very distressed and confused at her sudden exit. He figured she was probably just taking a breather. It was, after all, a lot to process. He just hoped she wouldn't get startled by the toilets in the restroom.

Just as Pike set aside his worries for the time-traveling teenager in the restroom, the other pain in his ass happened to walk through the entrance of the bar.

The Admiral watched as Jim Kirk sauntered his way through the door. He was out of his usual golden shirt uniform or his Starfleet greys and was wearing a casual pair of jeans, some boots, and a navy blue Henley with a grey denim jacket to match. His eyes scanned the restaurant until they finally found where his old mentor sat alone in the back, three discarded menus around him. Pike gave him a knowing smile as he made his way back and sat down beside him.

"Admiral," Jim greeted in an almost joking manor. Pike rolled his eyes. Jim knew just how much the title 'Admiral' ticked him off after a while. Pike loved Starfleet... he just hated all the damn paperwork. And Jim made sure to remind him of his duties each time he saw him.

"Captain Kirk," Pike practically grumbled in response at the kid across from him.

"So," Jim began before pausing, his eyes falling to the third chair pulled up beside them and the menu on top of the table in front of the seat. "Are we expecting anyone else, sir?"

Pike sighed and pursed his lips. "That's what we're here to discuss, Jim."

The blonde's eyebrows furrowed. "We are still discussing the _Enterprise_'s most recent mission to New Vulcan, right?"

"Well, our guest just so happens to tie directly into the reason for the ship's mission to New Vulcan," the Admiral explained.

Jim looked skeptical. "I thought it was just a standard medical resupply."

"That's what they told you," Pike took a deep breath, setting down his menu and turning t look Jim directly in the eye. Jim took this as a sign that he meant business. He always got like this. Every time Pike had something important or serious to tell him, he got real up close and personal. Not by means of distance, but just by staring directly into your soul with those grey eyes. "What I'm about to tell you is extremely classified. Only a handful of people at Starfleet know about this, and believe me when I tell you, the only reason you are being told about this is because I trust you with my life. And right now, I'm trusting you with a very precious piece of cargo to be transported from here to New Vulcan. Do you understand?"

Jim sat up straight in his chair and nodded. It was moments like these that really gave Pike whiplash sometimes when it came to the kid. One moment he'd be acting like a damn toddler, and the next he'd be acting just like his father. Prestige, professional... like a true captain. "I do, sir," he told Pike with complete sincerity.

"You are to tell no one of the true meaning behind the New Vulcan transport under any circumstances. Not even your crew," Pike continued to explain. He took a moment to pause when he noticed the slight hesitance in Jim's hard etched features. "Will that be a problem?"

Jim breathed in through his nose and exhaled through his mouth. "No, sir," he answered in an almost reluctant tone. He hated keeping things from his crew, but whatever this was, it was clearly important. Jim knew better than to question when Pike was serious with things. Especially covert things like this.

"Good," the Admiral remarked as he sat up straighter in his chair, a more relaxed stance now that he spotted the teenage girl in the boots walking over from out of the bathroom. Her hair was a bit wet and she seemed t be shaking off her hands. He figured she must've just splashed some water on her face and called it a day. A part of Pike was impressed to see her taking charge and pushing aside her issues to focus on the mission, but the other, more empathetical part of the Admiral, was quite worried for the teenager pushing down her feelings. But, he could deal with her teenage emotions later when he wasn't having to explain her odd circumstances to the captains seated across from him.

"Well then, Jim, I'd like to introduce you to your new medical specialist, Miss Amelia Proctor," Pike gestured to the blonde just as she pulled up her seat beside the two men.

Max, having just stepped into the conversation after nearly breaking down in the restroom, tried her best to refrain from rolling her eyes as she plopped down in the chair. She ran a hand through her blonde hair as she let our an exasperated sight. "It's just Max," she corrected the Admiral, not bothering to even acknowledge the new guy with them until Pike took it upon himself to introduce him.

"Max," he corrected himself, his eyes glaring at the blonde as he did so. "This is Captain Jim Kirk of the _U.S.S. Enterprise _– the ship taking you to the research center in New Vulcan," he explained.

Jim looked up at her, his eyes going wide as he took a double take. This girl couldn't have been older than Chekov, and she definitely wasn't in Starfleet, he would've heard about another teenager. So, then why was she suddenly his medical specialist for this mission? "Um... it's nice to meet you," he greeted the girl, extending his hand out to shake.

He watched as Max glanced down at his hand, looked up at him, then turned to Pike as if she hadn't seen it to begin with. "I thought this was supposed to be a covert mission? Why are we bringing in Brad Pitt over here?" She asked the Admiral, throwing a glance back at Jim, speaking as if he weren't sitting right next to them. Who was this kid? And who the hell was Brad Pitt?

"I trust Jim with my life," Pike was quick to come to Kirk's defense. "And I'm going to be trusting yours with his, as well. If he's up for it, that is." Suddenly, both pairs of eyes were on him, glaring daggers at him expectantly.

Jim nodded as he replied cooly, "I will make sure Miss Proctor is safe on her trip to New Vulcan." Pike nodded his gratitude, but the blonde beside him didn't look too convinced. "But, I just gotta ask. Who is she and why is she so important that she needs her own personal Starfleet escort there?"

The teenager seemed to shift uncomfortably under the scrutiny of Jim's prying stare. Her eyes fell down to the glass of water that had been placed there moments before. She pretended to find it rather interesting and Jim took it as a sign that he wasn't getting any answers from her. He turned to Pike expectantly.

The Admiral sighed heavily as he clasped his hands together on the table top in front of him. "Jim, like I said before, you cannot tell anyone about what I am about to tell you now. Not your second in command, not your friends, not your crew. No one. This is a highly covert operation, and the only reason I was given the clearance to tell you what this mission entails is because I trust you. Not only with my life and these secrets, but now, Miss Proctor's life." Jim and Pike turned to glance at the girl beside them. She certainly looked less than pleased with these circumstances.

"What's so special about her?" Jim wondered aloud to the Admiral. "Well, for starters, Max is over 200 years old," Pike replied, not the slightest hint of humor behind his words.

"Pfft," Jim's initial response was to scoff in disbelief. "No way. You're telling me Barely Legal over here is over two centuries old? C'mon, Pike, it would be more believable if you told me she was my long lost daughter." The table was quiet after the Captain's statement. Jim grew increasingly worried at his choice of words and what they implied when Pike began to glance between Kirk and the slightly similar looking Max across from him.

"_Seriously_?" Both blondes simultaneously asked. Max, out of frustration, and Kirk, out of actual worry.

Pike couldn't help but chuckle at the obvious similarities between the two. But, he also couldn't help but wonder if their alikeness would lead to a golden team in the making or an even bigger problem than what he had now with just one blonde-haired, blue-eyes nuisance in a starship. "No. Miss Proctor is not related to you in the slightest. So far that I know of."

Jim visibly relaxed in his seat. He went so far as gesturing for the bar tender to bring him a drink after the scare to help soothe him some more. "You're an ass sometimes, you know that?" Kirk muttered unappreciatively to the Admiral.

Pike smiled knowingly. "So I've been told by you before."

All the while the two men were sharing a bonding moment, Max couldn't help but grow more and more frustrating at the lack of seriousness on the matter of her returning home. "Um, excuse me," she cut in swiftly, bringing both men's attention back to her. "Can we please get back to the mission?"

Jim couldn't help but roll his eyes. He wondered who put this kid in charge and why Pike even dragged him away from the Enterprise for this brat. If she wasn't his, then why was she suddenly his problem?

"She's right, Jim," Pike was quick to take her side. Jim wondered if the Admiral had caught his sour expression towards the girl. "As I was saying earlier, Max is in fact over 200 hundred years old."

"So... You're telling me that this kid somehow time traveled into the future?" Kirk asked in disbelief just as the bar tender set down a glass of dark liquor in front of him.

Max grit her teeth in annoyance at how this so called Captain continued to treat her like nothing more than some puny kid. "This kid has a name, Captain Jackass," she spat at him through her clenched jaw.

"Max," Pike gave the girl beside him a look of warning. She acknowledged it begrudgingly and stood down from any further confrontation. Just like a good little soldier. After dealing with the teenage girl's frustrations, Pike turned back to the literal five-year-old of a man next to him. "And to answer your question, yes. That's what we know so far. Max was found early yesterday morning unconscious on one of the South lawns of the Academy Campus. The doctors looked her over and after a closer examination we found that not only is she from another century, but she also carries an unknown and highly advanced substance within her."

That seemed to spark Kirk's interest as he glanced between Pike and the blonde girl across from him in curiosity. Max could tell immediately just how invested he was in solving other people's problems. It was probably why he was the captain of his own spaceship, she figured.

Kirk, intrigued, turned towards Max again. "You don't remember how you got here?"

"You think if I did, the person who brought me here and shot me up with enough drugs to put me in a mild coma would still be alive and breathing?" She retorted in a cold and calculating voice.

Jim, both surprised and perplexed by her bluntness, only shrugged. "Good point."

"Jim," Pike's very calm and collected voice pulled Kirk's attention back to the Admiral. His piercing grey eyes kept him frozen as he hung onto every word as if they were his new gospel. "You are to protect Miss Proctor with your life. The substance in her veins could very well either destroy or enhance the universe as we know it, for all anyone knows."

Jim nodded, his lips turned in a straight line and all signs of goofiness or nonchalance was gone. "I understand completely, sir."

Pike then turned to Max and gave her the exact same look that kept her in her place. "You're to do as Jim says from this point forward. He is here to protect you and I trust you to let him do his job in order to return you to safety. Is that understood?"

Max felt her heart beating in her ears as she nodded. "Yes, Admiral." She cursed at the tightness in her voice and hoped neither of the men had caught onto it. The last thing she needed was to be getting nervous in a matter like this. But it wasn't just the task that scared Max or the significance of it, it was the hope Pike gave her that she would return. She felt it build and build within her like a balloon that she would get to go home when the dust settled on this huge mess. But, the dangerous thing about hope was that even the smallest of screw-ups could pop her balloon, sending everything around it tumbling down.

"Good," Pike nodded as he sat back in his chair. "Now, what do you wanna eat, Max?"

The blonde shook her head. "I'm not really that hungry," she answered. Truth be told, she thought that if she ate anything it would only end up in one of those fancy ass toilets she had seen while in the restroom earlier. This was all just a lot to handle.

However, Pike didn't push her to eat. Instead, he turned to Jim and offered the Sam question. It seemed no one really had an appetite that day. "I'm good," the Captain turned him down politely. He too wasn't really in the mood to eat right now.

"Hmm," Pike hummed as he glanced between the two blondes who's eyes were glued to the table. He wanted them to talk and maybe get to know each other better, but his efforts of trying to spark up a conversation were put on pause when his Communicator began to ring in his pocket. "I've gotta take this. You two play nice," he told the two kids before walking off to take the call, leaving the pair of blondes to talk amongst themselves.

Jim stared across the table at Max, who refused t meet his glance but could tell his eyes were on her. She knew he probably had about a million questions for her and he knew she probably had a million questions for him, too. But, the first question to pop out of Jim's mouth ended up being, "So... time travel?"

Max glanced up at him through her eyelashes with an unimpressed expression on her face. Nonetheless, she replied in a dull tone, "So... space travel?"

–––

Max stood at the edge of the sidewalk just outside the restaurant, her hair blowing in the wind as her gaze was set upon the open horizon of new and beautifully architectured buildings with ships flying all around them and hovering cars speeding past them. It was all so... surreal. She wondered if maybe she was dreaming, making up it all up in her head. Maybe she was in a coma.

From far away, Max thought she heard her name being called, but her eyes were so fixed on her surroundings, she hadn't paid any mind to it.

"Why don't you go bring your ride around? I'll stay here with her," she heard the same voice call to someone unseen. It was Pike talking to Captain Kirk. She knew because she watched out of the corner of her eyes as the blonde Captain walked off down the sidewalk towards a parking garage across the street and could hear Pike walking towards her in his nicely polished shoes that made noise when he walked.

For a moment, both the girl out of time and the Admiral were quiet. Max remaining silent, hoping to wake up from this nightmare, and Pike respecting her peace by remaining mute. That was until he saw Jim begin to pull out of the garage on his motorbike. It was time for Max to go.

"Max, can you hear me?" Pike eventually spoke. She turned to look at him in response. "The ship to New Vulcan doesn't leave until tomorrow morning. Until then, you're gonna stay with Jim, alright?"

Max turned her attention back to the street where the Captain was beginning to pull up on the back of a motorcycle, but without rims... This day just kept getting better, huh?

Pike must've noticed her exasperated look. "He's going to look out for you. Don't try to fight him on anything, please, Max." Max looked reluctant as she clenched her jaw and nodded in agreement. "Please listen to what he tells you. If you want to make it home, you have to do as he says, understood?"

"Yes, sir," Max replied firmly.

Both Max and Pike turned when the Captain revved the engine of his bike, trying to catch their attention as he put it in park by the sidewalk and took of his helmet. His eyes traveled back to the pair a few yards away. Max shifted nervously in her place, scared about what to expect from this Captain- or really anyone besides Pike. There was just something about him that she just knew she could trust. But could she trust Kirk?

"Hey," Pike's voice beckoned for her attention to be drawn back to him. "Do you trust me?"

"I don't have much of a choice but to," she replied truthfully.

"You always have a choice," he rebutted. "So, do you trust me?"

Max paused. "... yes," she sighed.

"Good. Because I trust him," Pike told her, his eyes glancing over her shoulder at Captain Kirk.

"Enough to keep me safe and to get me home?" She prompted.

"Yes," he told her whole-heartedly.

Max pursed her lips together, her weight shifting back and forth between her feet as she debated just asking Pike if she could stay with him instead. But she knew she couldn't. She had a mission. She had to get home. And to do that, she need to trust Pike and go with Kirk.

"Okay then," she muttered.

Pike watched as the blonde turned on her heel and made her way down the sidewalk towards where Jim was parked on his bike. He looked like he felt a little bit of sympathy for the nervous kid as he too watched as she trudged towards him, her eyes downcast to the ground so not to meet his gaze. "Here," she looked up to see him holding out a matte black helmet to her.

She took it without argument, sparing him a muffled 'thanks' as she wasted no time in putting it on. Once the helmet was in place on her head, she threw her leg over the bike and took a seat behind the Captain, her hands hesitantly hovering on his back as she debated wrapping them around his waste. He was, after all, still a stranger to her.

Max felt him kick the stand up and slowly ease the bike away from the curb. "Hang on tight, kid," she heard him call over his shoulder. Max was about to make a retort about her name and the nickname 'kid', but was cut short when the bike jerked into motion. Max yelped and quickly clung onto the Captain's frame, her arms wrapping around his waist and her chest pressed firmly to his back as the bike whizzed through the streets at an alarming speed.

"Jesus Christ," she muttered beneath her breath as she watched through the shaded lens of the mask as the street beneath her feet flew by. She didn't have the courage to actually look up until the bike eventually stopped at a stop light. "You have a thing for speed, Captain Kirk?" She shouted over his shoulder in an out of breath voice.

"Nope," he called back over the sound of the bike engine revving some more, warning her that he was getting ready to go faster once the light turned green again. She tightened her grip on him as she too got ready for that moment. "But I love flying," were the last words she heard coming from the Captain before the motorbike lurched into motion.

"_Holy_-"

Her curse was drowned out by the sounds of the motorcycle engine and Kirk's laughter. _Asshole_, she thought bitterly as she peered over his shoulder to glare at him. She was hellbent on punching him or maybe head-butting him with the helmet on, but her mood abruptly softened when she saw the sights around her from the back of the bike.

She watched in amazement as all those amazing buildings she had been looking at from far away were suddenly right above and around her. They were even more magnificent and grand up close than they were from far away. The sun was beginning to set on the ocean horizon of the San Francisco bay, but the orange sunlight reflected from off of all the hundreds and thousands of glass windows of the buildings, creating a mesmerizing lights how like no other just above the pair driving on the bike below. Back home in Hawaii, she had seen the sun's rays reflect off the waves of the ocean, and on the other side of the road the jungle bursting with tall trees and vibrant greenery that towered above her. But this futuristic city was like a reflection of both the ocean and the jungle, welcoming her like an old friend.

Max couldn't help the smile that escaped as she threw her head back and looked up at it all as they passed, taking in all the wonder like a kid in a candy store. Kirk peered over his shoulder and saw the kid staring at all of the city in amazement and decided to slow it down a bit for her to enjoy it. He himself had gotten over the wonders of the big city a while ago, but he himself remembered just how marvelous it had been when it still surprised him. He was glad to help her experience her joy.

Eventually, the tour of the city of was over when Kirk pulled the bike into another parking garage beneath a large shining building. They went up a few floors before he eventually parked near a fancy looking elevator. When they finally stopped, Max was up and off the vehicle before Kirk could even take out the keys.

He chuckled at her reaction to his bike. "What? I thought I drove pretty well," he quipped as she pulled off the helmet and fixed him with an unamused glare.

"You drive like a maniac," she retorted.

"Oh, please." She waited on one side of the bike as he slid off on the other side and turned to her with a smile. "If I can captain a Starship, I can sure as hell drive my motorcycle," he assured her with a wink.

The blonde only stared at him, clearly unimpressed with his humor. "You know, with such a big head I'm surprised this helmet even fits you," she replied in a dry tone as she shoved said helmet into his stomach for him to catch. Without so much as another glance in his direction, she walked off towards the elevator. But it wasn't until she got there that she realized storming off like that probably wasn't the smartest idea. Partially due to the fact that 1) she had no clue which floor she was going to, and 2) she also had no clue how to work the complicated touch screen beside the elevator doors.

So, instead of trying to escape Kirk and his cocky personality, she had to wait for him to come and help her work the elevator. Now she knew how Sal's mom felt whenever she tried coaxing Max or one of her brothers to help figure out her phone or laptop or just technology in general.

The Captian had a smug grin on his face when he caught up with her and pressed a few buttons in the elevator screen. He looked like he was going to say something stupid, but she cut that off immediately. "Shut up." The Captain just chuckled, shaking his head as he entered the elevator after Max.

Max wasn't sure what she expected from the Captain's living arrangements, but what she arrived to definitely wasn't it. It was... well, enormous. It was a large Penthouse expansion with reflective tiled floors, a kitchen the size of her house back home in the far corner, crazy and futuristic furniture, an enormous television that looked like the kind they had in movie theaters in the huge living room, and floor-to-ceiling windows that stretched across the entire far side of the apartment that revealed the breathtaking view of the city below.

As Max entered the apartment, slowly processing everything around her, Kirk chuckled at her reaction and just waltzed right past her towards the kitchen where he dropped his keys and the helmet into the monstrous kitchen island. "Make yourself comfortable, kid. Don't worry about breaking anything, it's all replaceable. Just stay out of the liquor cabinet..."

He continued to prattle on about what she could and couldn't do in his apartment, but Max just tuned him out in favor of admiring the city of San Francisco from high up in the sky. She hadn't even realized she was so close to the edge until she peered just past the floorboards of the windows and could see just how high they were. It was incredible and nerve-racking at the same time. She loved it.

"You really like this city, huh?"

Max jumped from the close proximity of the Captain, who had somehow managed to sneak up on her until he was standing beside her, his eyes scanning the city skyline just as hers had. She went back to admiring it again.

"I don't think I'd ever get used to this view if I lived here," she replied.

Kirk smiled. "I felt the same way at first," he explained. "Until I saw the view from up there."

Max turned to see what he was talking about and found him pointing up to the sky that was beginning to grow darker as the sun got lower. Max took a step towards the glass and narrowed her eyes to get a better look at what Kirk had been gesturing to. It wasn't until she saw the outline of what looked like an enormouse space station in the sky lit up by the natural light of the sun still cast on it up above, that she was truly rendered speechless at the fact that she most certainly was in the future. There was no way her mind could make up such crazy and unbelievable things.

"Holy shit..."

•••

**_A/N: Max being a nerd is the purest thing and I'd die for her to be a nerd. Kirk, too. And as we can see, they are a little too alike for either one of their own liking. _**

**_Sidenote: quarantine is kicking my ass. I go to sleep at 6am everyday and wake up at 1 pm. Every time I try and fix this fucked up schedule, I just make it worse. Ughhhhh. And to make things worse, my appetite is GONE. fuck you, body without a structured schedule, fuck you. _**


End file.
